


The Scrapper

by kakashi_mole



Category: Lackadaisy (Webcomic)
Genre: Character Study, Domestic Violence, Dubious Consent, Gen, Headcanon, Injury, Original Character(s), Slurs, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:28:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23355445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kakashi_mole/pseuds/kakashi_mole
Summary: Moments in the life of Mordecai Heller
Comments: 5
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> An exploration in the life of Mordecai Heller. These are mostly headcanon scenarios and speculation that hopefully stick close to the canon.   
> For instance, I don’t know how old Mordecai was when his father died, but for the sake of the fic’s continuity, I guessed his age to be around 14 years old.  
> There are several time skips which bring up childhood memories.  
> I also wrote about headcanon injuries and scars that I imagine Mordecai has, including some he actually does have in the comic.  
> Oh, I guess I should mention that I wrote the characters as though they were human (although I do adore the anthropomorphized cats in the comic).  
> I hope it’s an enjoyable read! Thanks for stopping by.

**Part One**  
**Spring, 1921**

Atlas May gave Mordecai three simple tasks for the wedding, and that was to pick up the flowers, make sure the flowers were of the highest quality, and to keep a pea shooter handgun tucked inside his suit’s breast pocket. 

“Keep it small and keep it hidden. No telling what damn fool would want to start a commotion on my wedding day, but…” 

Atlas placed his hand on Mordecai’s shoulder and offered a gentle smile. 

“One other thing.” He shifted the umbrella under his arm. 

Mordecai waited for his boss to tell him to loosen up, to relax, to smile at the wedding. It was a celebration after all. 

“I’m glad you’ll be there,” Atlas said. He reached out and adjusted Mordecai's tie. There was an absentmindedness to Atlas’s movement, a sort of distraction that made Mordecai think he was witnessing his employer’s anxious nerves for the first time. Atlas gave Mordecai’s shoulder a pat before stepping outside the Little Daisy Cafe. 

It had been Atlas’s request to speak to his triggerman early that morning. The sun hadn’t come up yet and the streetlights outside illuminated the darkness. The faint sound of rumbling thunderclouds rolled in from the north. 

Mordecai had left his umbrella at his apartment. In fact, he had also left his wallet and his pistols at the apartment. That morning before coming to the Little Daisy, he had put on two left shoes and almost tripped down the stairs of his apartment building. 

He was running on four hours of sleep, an empty stomach, and a hangover the size of the Mississippi River. The previous night Atlas’s boys had put together a quick ragtag bachelor’s party consisting of several liters of liquor, three boxes of thick Cuban cigars, two cherry pies that somebody’s wife had conjured up, and a live peacock which strut about the underground speakeasy. 

Mordecai’s headache pulsed at remembering how he foolishly agreed to have a shot of whiskey, which turned into two shots, then three. In a way, he liked how the drink loosened him up. After a few, he could carry on a conversation with someone like it was the most damned interesting exchange of his life. 

And yet, he knew going into that party of debauchery that if he drank, he’d drink too much and would surely regret it come morning. 

Despite the lack of sleep and pounding headache, Mordecai kept true to his word and arrived at the Little Daisy before dawn so Atlas could speak to him alone. 

All he’d told him were the three instructions. Mordecai couldn’t help but think his employer had more to say, but he wasn’t one to pry into Atlas’s personal life. He was there to do a job and he intended to do it well. 

Flowers at nine a.m. Be at the chapel by ten a.m. Ceremony starts at eleven a.m. 

Mordecai checked his pocketwatch. It was a quarter past six. The spring weather had made the birds start singing well before dawn. He looked out the big glass window and saw the dark silhouette of the cherry blossoms. Within the trees the birds had begun their chirping. Mordecai rubbed the temples of his head. Beyond the gentle shapes of the trees and the incessant chirping of lovebirds, the storm clouds rolled in, heavy and pressurized and opaque. 

The young man went into the kitchen and poured a glass of water. He drank and thought, if it rained, then it rained, and the frivolous fuss the wedding guests would have over it would only add to his annoyance. 

He wasn’t much to rely on hope, since he placed objective fact above all else, but a preference for clear skies and sunlight wasn’t too much to wish for, was it? 

He ran a hand through his hair. It had gotten too long, and the unkempt locks fell into his eyes. He didn’t have time or the conscientiousness to properly prepare himself for the day, including slicking his hair back with pomade, and when he had arrived to meet Atlas that dark morning, he looked worse for wear and terribly embarrassed to be in such an unpresentable state. 

Seeing as he had time to kill, Mordecai went into the little office to do some work. It was a room big enough to be a broom closet, tucked away in a remote corner of the kitchen. His shoes clacked against the tiled floor and he turned on the light. It was always as he had left it, since the rest of the crew knew better than to disarray his workspace. The walls were lined with filing cabinets, the desk was bare, save for the ledger book and an outdated adding machine which had frequent paper jams. 

Atlas figured there was no rush to buy a new one, since Mordecai could do the math all by hand without error. 

He sat at the desk, sharpened a pencil, and opened the ledger to jot down a few numbers. Within a minute he was already going through the filing cabinets, searching for past records and propping them open against the desk and his thigh. His line of sight moved like this for some time, lost in the pattern of numbers and the grids arranged like city blocks. He could get so lost in bookkeeping that at a certain point his mind went on automatic, similar to how his fellow associate Viktor Vasko could drive an automobile while clearly absorbed in his own silent thoughts. 

The pen marked against the paper, hand sliding down the uniform lines, and Mordecai slipped into an old memory of New York. The city was chaos— his memory of those rough and rowdy days were far from eradicated— but if one were to look at it from a bird’s eye view, the city’s design could be commended for its use of orderly grids. The streets lined up, the path always made sense. It was a city of geometry. He remembered following those indefinite geometrical streets alongside the neighborhood boys, alongside his sisters. Mordecai paused for a moment, tilting his head. He had a sudden urge to go out and find a map of New York City, because he wanted to find the street where he grew up on and put his finger on it, to know it was real and still someplace he could go, that is, if he wanted… 

“Mordecai?” 

Mordecai blinked, his eyes focusing on the figure in front of him. It was Mitzi. Her short hair was loose and wild. There were dark circles beneath her eyes. She shifted her robe over her nightgown, saying in between yawns, “You’re here early.” 

The yawn was contagious, and Mordecai stifled his own as he answered, “Atlas asked to see me before the commotion.” He checked his pocketwatch. “The menagerie of guests will come bearing gifts of pearls and debauchery in a few hours.” 

The bride-to-be said nothing. She stared at the floor. After a moment, she turned and left, her footsteps echoing throughout the corridor. He heard her footsteps resound above his head as she walked up the stairwell. 

He finished the last string of digits in the ledger, rounding up the numbers so that no loose cents went unchecked, before standing to go into the adjacent restroom. 

The mirror had no intention of flattering him. Mordecai grimaced at his reflection— his suit was rumpled and untucked, the tie was loose and crooked, dark circles were under bloodshot eyes, and his hair stuck out in haphazard tufts. He leaned in closer and saw a darkened stubble over his jaw. Mordecai splashed cold water on his face, grimacing through the continuous pounding headache. 

How much did he drink last night? He tried to recall. It was certainly more than he could handle. Did he say anything to anyone? Anything embarrassing or damning? Was Atlas’s peculiar behavior this morning a result of something his hired hitman had drunkenly blabbered? 

The faucet water suddenly ran steaming hot, and Mordecai hissed, jerking his hand back. He stood facing his reflection for a few moments, deciding he wouldn’t have time to go to his apartment to clean up. Swiftly he took to the dark hallway, intent on entering the upstairs apartment. He climbed the stairs and walked towards Mitzi and Atlas’s bedroom. 

The door was slightly ajar. Rapping his knuckle against it, Mordecai called out Mitzi’s name. 

“Come in,” she answered. 

Mordecai pushed the door open, then stopped mid-step. 

Mitzi was dressed in her wedding gown. It was striking, the sudden display of white in the otherwise dimly lit room. A lamp on the bedside table cast a golden glow over the room and onto her dress. The dress was cream-colored, not perfectly white, but like a pearl that had yet to be finished. Mitzi unpinned the veil from her head and tossed it to the unmade bed, where it floated slowly like a feather onto the silk sheets. 

“Ta-da,” she flouted, gesturing at herself. She turned in a circle, then shrugged. 

“You seem less than enthusiastic— reluctant, even,” Mordecai assuaged. 

Mitzi tugged at the fingers of the silk evening gloves covering her arms. One by one she slipped her fingers free. 

“I’m terribly nervous,” she admitted. Her hands trembled. She quipped with a dry laugh, “I can sing and play a ukulele in front of hundreds, but to do this—” She placed her hand on her forehead. “I don’t understand why _this_ is giving me stage fright.” 

The young woman tossed the gloves on top the veil. She took to the window and peered behind the curtain before returning her attention back to Mordecai. 

“Did you need something?” 

“Oh, mm,” he began, clearing his throat. “I need to borrow Atlas’s—” He stopped, too embarrassed to admit he was going to use his employer’s shaving kit. 

Mitzi smirked, her hand going to her hip. 

“Lord, it’s been how long since Atlas picked you up? And here we are, you an honorary guest of our wedding, still afraid to borrow a razor.” 

She pointed at her chin, indicating that she could see the stubble. 

“My, _what_ are we going to do with you?” 

The lolling Georgia accent settled in the air like a humid summer evening. It came out most when she was playing someone, because despite the crafted conduct of a debutante Mitzi had procured during her time at St. Louis, the wily Southern girl inside was pressed to come through at the best and worst of times. 

Mordecai rolled his eyes, running his hand through his hair. The bangs were bothering him and it didn’t help that his heartbeat was sending pulses of a migraine behind his eyes. 

“You word it as though you and Atlas are my parents.” He stepped into the bathroom. A pair of hose stockings laid over the tub. A fresh bouquet of violets sat on the window ledge. He quickly checked his pocketwatch. The time was a quarter ’til eight a.m. One hour, he reminded himself. 

“Are we not?” Mitzi teased, following behind. 

Mordecai ignored her, opening the medicine cabinet. He took out Atlas’s shaving kit, hesitating for just a moment before deciding to just get it over with. The tempered glass window to the left revealed the first grey light of sunrise. 

Focusing on the task at hand, Mordecai scoffed, “First of all, you’re the same age as me, so in no way do you have any parental imposition over me. Secondly—” he gestured at the window with the shaving brush, “— it’s going to rain on your big day. And finally, I don’t have time to entertain your ceaseless hyperbolic imaginings. You should try to put yourself together _before_ the wedding, yes?” He removed his glasses, looking at Mitzi to see her as a blurry figure of curve and cream colored fabric. 

Mitzi crossed her arms and scrunched her face in disgust. 

“I was only picking on you honey. Try not to be such a bluenose at the ceremony, okay?” 

She waltzed from the room, leaving Mordecai to lather his face with shaving cream. He set to the first downward stroke of the razor. Rinse, repeat. Halfway through, his eyes went crossed. He blinked, refocusing his vision to see Mitzi’s reflection in the bathroom mirror. She was sitting on the bed, holding a framed picture in her lap. Mordecai could only guess that it was one of the photos of her and Atlas. 

He adjusted himself, but found it difficult to move in the suit. Shrugging off the suit jacket with one hand, and then the white button down shirt, Mordecai let the two articles of clothing slide off his arms and into his hand, where he lifted them to place on a towel rack. His bare arms felt the chill of the bathroom. Goosebumps raised on his skin. With his thumb he slipped his suspenders off and down his shoulders. 

In the mirror, the reflection of a thick, red scar showed on his left bicep. It branched out like the delta of a riverbed. When he had first received that scar, he’d absently trace his fingers over the raised flesh, the skin unable to feel, like a foreign entity had healed itself into his arm. 

“Mordecai?” 

He paused, peering around the doorway. 

Mitzi was still sitting on the bed, her hands holding the picture frame. 

“Never mind.” 

Mordecai waited for another moment, but Mitzi had gone silent. He returned in front of the mirror, careful to shave off the next part in one clean stroke. 

Suddenly she appeared from around the door, her eyebrows knitted together, a smile tugging at the corner of her lips. 

“I think you’d be a better bride than me.” 

Mordecai sighed. 

“A bride is supposed to be undoubtedly loyal, and I get the feeling you’re the loyal kind who’d rather die like a dog…” 

Mitzi paused. She looked him up and down. 

“…At his master’s feet, rather than turn tail and run.” 

“You’re not loyal?” Mordecai muttered, concentrating on a single elusive hair on his chin. 

“I’m plenty loyal,” Mitzi shot back, then added, “but there’s some things I don’t want to give up.” 

Her tone was final, hard like the concrete foundation of a newly built home. Mordecai did not argue with such a tone. There was no room to pry further. He had seen her play the ukulele in the band, her voice amplified in the microphone, but he had seen her sit in Atlas’s lap, caressing his face, and the confidence she showed in both instances seemed almost identical. 

_She has no reason for cold feet_ , he thought to himself. She had agreed to this engagement. 

_So follow through with it_. 

He ran the faucet, splashed his face with cold water. His hair stuck to his forehead. He tried pushing it off his face, but it had gotten too long and would not cooperate. 

_I shouldn’t have put off a haircut for so long_ , he thought to himself. The business of this wedding had thrown him off, something about the beginning of spring had him prone to daydreaming. Why the hell had he drank so much last night? 

“You need a haircut?” Mitzi asked. 

Mordecai dried his face with a towel, revealing his eyes to squint at her. 

She continued, “Wait here.” 

She left the bathroom, then returned with a four post wicker chair. She set the chair in front of Mordecai so that it blocked the doorway. 

“Go on, sit.” 

“Mitzi, I don’t have time…” 

She placed both hands on Mordecai’s shoulders and shoved him down to sit. His headache encouraged it. Standing only made the pounding flashes of pain worse. 

Mitzi used the towel to wipe clean the scissors kept in the medicine cabinet. The rising sun was coming through the window and it made the scissors shine. She thought about that single phrase she would say today— “I do”— and it put her on edge. It was a promise of the future but there was no guarantee. What would she do for the future? Put on a performance for the party-goers at the Lackadaisy Speakeasy? Was she even cut out for married life? Could she give herself away? 

No, at least here and now, what she was doing was giving a haircut. _That_ she could do. It was a remnant of the past, when she was young and in charge of her siblings back in Savannah, Georgia. She fed them, she washed them. She disciplined them. 

_Imagine that_ , she mused. _A child in charge of other children_. 

Typically, Mordecai Heller did not allow anyone to cut his hair besides himself or a professional. However, time was running short this morning, and the migraine he had procured last night was only making him reluctant to argue. What he would give to curl up in bed and sleep the rest of the day off. 

He watched their reflections in the bathroom mirror, Mitzi hovering over his head with scissors, his bare shoulders hunched forward as he kept his hands in his lap. The morning sun was breaking through the rainclouds, sending pirouettes of yellow and orange sparkles on the various objects in the room: the expensive jewelry, the brass faucet, the beads of water on the violets, the pair of scissors in Mitzi’s hand as they made the first snip. 

“Don’t worry hon. I used to give my little brothers haircuts all the time.” 

“And I’m sure they looked horrendous. Also, don’t call me that.” 

“Call you what?” 

“ _Hon_ ,” he quipped, imitating her Southern accent. 

Mitzi smiled and snipped the air with the scissors. 

“You’re being especially prickly today.” 

Mordecai closed his eyes as she placed her hand on the back of his head and tilted his neck forward. He felt the scissors graze over the back of his neck. 

“I wonder what’s on his mind,” Mitzi mused. “Atlas, I mean.” 

_He’s not getting cold feet, if that’s what you’re wondering_ , Mordecai thought. 

“He’s always been a thoughtful person,” she continued. “It’s just…he came into the bedroom late last night and seemed so quiet. So distracted.” 

The scissors snipped, her hands pressed against his scalp. 

She laughed, adding, “He also said Viktor had to carry you to your apartment.” 

Mordecai bristled, his eyes widening. 

“He did not.” 

“He did. Viktor carried you on his back, and you were reciting some dry philosophical speech about _modern courtship_ while he carried you.” 

His face burned red, and he made to stand, but Mitzi kept him down, her hand still pressed against his head. 

“Keep still,” she said, brushing the stray hairs from the back of his neck. 

Mordecai clicked his tongue and crossed his arms. 

“I prefer to believe you’re making that last part up, just to rile me, or to amuse yourself.” 

He straightened himself as Mitzi moved to the front of his head, straightening out his bangs with two fingers. 

He continued, “If that’s the case, then I suppose I permit it. It is your wedding day after all.” 

Mitzi smiled, the familiar dreamy softness returning to her eyes. 

“Atlas is a businessman. He may seem distracted because he’s trying to make your union legitimate,” Mordecai stated. 

“Ha. There’s more to marriage than legalities, you know.” 

“I assume as much.” 

Mitzi tutted under her breath. She left the room for a moment, the sound of a dresser drawer opening and closing with her movements, then returned with a lit cigarette between her lips. Mordecai watched her reflection glide over to the side of his head, the trail of smoke lifting like a halo above her. 

“You’ve got a thick head of hair,” she said. She puffed on the cigarette held between her lips, her fingers running through his hair before picking up the scissors once again. 

“Everyone in my family does.” 

He said it without thinking first. He tensed up a little, clearing his throat, his eyes darting from the mirror to the window. Without his glasses the world was an impressionistic smudge of shape and color. It would be pretty if he could relax, but he could not. Something like ice in his blood made him rigid. Something like fire surrounding him made it difficult to see the world as anything but a test. 

Memories rushed to him at that moment. A test on his eyes as a child proved he could hardly see. A look in the mirror showed his left eye turning slightly inward. The other schoolchildren thought he was mentally deficient because of that crossed eye. They mocked him, teased him, and if they touched him, Mordecai did not hesitate. He was so unforgiving in his infliction of pain onto those bullies that after awhile, they refused to get near him. 

There was an ice in him that seemed to put out the world’s fire. 

Vision blurry, Mordecai looked into the mirror to see Mitzi’s reflection, the back of her wedding dress an intricate floral design weaving in and out of ribbons of white satin. Back and forth, it was the pair of them— Mitzi in her wedding gown, the sway of her steps causing the fabric to swish; outside, the canopy of trees rustling in a calm spring breeze— Mordecai in his white tank top and rumpled trousers, an exhausted look of sleep deprivation etched onto his face— and above them, the roof of the home Atlas owned, providing shelter for vagabonds and runaways. 

He did not want her to ask about his family. She exhaled a heavy breath of smoke. She was too concentrated on the way the scissors failed to cut away the thick chunks of hair. She had to work in careful, small snips. 

They were quiet, save for Mordecai griping about cigarette ash getting into his hair, and Mitzi telling him it wouldn’t matter since he had streaks of grey in his hair already, to which Mordecai huffed that he did not have grey in his hair, only to squint at his reflection in the mirror to see if it were true— albeit stealthily, of course. 

Not stealthy enough, as Mitzi put the back of her hand to her mouth and laughed under her breath. 

“I’m only kidding. I’d give it until you’re twenty-five before you start sprouting grey hair.” She ashed her cigarette into the sink. “It won’t be long until you’re sporting a cane.” 

Mordecai scoffed, about to retaliate, but Mitzi moved in front of him and brushed the front locks of his hair down his forehead. Her hand was cool and steady. Two fingers tugged at a lock of hair at the front of his face, before the scissors snipped it off. Mordecai closed his eyes and pursed his mouth, feeling the fallen cut hair tickle his nose. 

From outside they could hear the first automobile of daybreak pass by, its tires rolling over the cobblestone street, and the sound of a bluebird cheerily singing amidst the pink and white blossoming trees. Mordecai kept his eyes closed. He smelled the cigarette smoke and Mitzi’s flowery perfume whirl in front of his face and felt the slight brush of her wedding dress touch the surface of his hands. 

Esther and Rose used to play wedding when they were kids, and Mordecai was forced to either play as the rabbi or the bridegroom. Often he would become a mesh of both. He opted for the former, since it meant enunciating big words from the Scripture. Esther erected the chuppah out of bedsheets and dandelions she had pulled from the street outside. She hung it over the kitchen chairs, and Rose made a little veil out of a dishtowel to cover her face. Mordecai read Genesis, biting his lip to keep from laughing as Rose circled him seven times, and Esther pretended to smash their mother’s glassware onto the floor while shouting “ _Mazel Tov_!” 

The glass never left her hands, until one time it did. Esther had taken their mother’s favorite china teacup, the one with blue and gold flowers painted on it, and pretended to throw it to the ground. The teacup slipped from her hands and smashed on the floor. 

The three siblings went completely still, their eyes wide in disbelief. Rose began crying. 

Mordecai remembered picking up each piece of the china carefully but quickly, listening for the front door lock turning, which would ultimately signal that his mother had come home from work. 

She had never known about the incident. When she questioned where her favorite teacup had gone, Mordecai had lied. 

Sitting in the wicker chair in Atlas and Mitzi’s bathroom, Mordecai looked to his hands, frowning. He remembered how easily and deliberately he had lied to his mother. 

Feeling Mitzi’s fingers run through his hair reminded him of when he was young, and his mother would run her fingers through his hair while he rested his head on her lap. His mother did not smell like flowers; rather, she smelled of damp earth and iron cooking pots and dust from the factory she toiled in, day after day, just to put enough food on the table. He could hardly remember his mother’s face as it was when he was a child— only the memory of her touch. It was quiet afternoons after school when he would lay on the sofa, his head resting on her lap, her hands running through his hair as he dozed off. There was a certain kind of safe warmth during those moments, something that had dissipated the day he fled from the city. 

Mitzi’s hand pressed the top of his head. 

Heat burned across his cheeks and he felt irritated to confuse that moment of his life with the present moment, which was that Mitzi was no doubt going to leave him with an uneven, asymmetrical haircut. He drew in a deep breath, gripped the arms of the chair, and clamped his eyes shut. Mitzi took a step to the right side of his head and began to work. 

After a moment she paused and whistled. 

“That’s quite a scar,” she said. 

Mordecai opened his eyes to see her pushing back his hair, revealing the speckled array of white scars on his scalp. They were small but plentiful, like splatters of paint thrown onto a canvas. He squirmed and swatted away her hand. 

“Did you get them in some accident? You know—” 

Mitzi lowered her voice. She made her hand in the shape of a gun. 

“Doing the devil’s work.” In one fluid motion she put her finger on the four month old scar on his bicep. “Like this one? Atlas said a shotgun bit you.” 

Mordecai brushed her hand off his arm. 

She grinned, her sleepy eyes warm with playfulness. Mordecai always chastised himself whenever he indulged her coyness— it was because his sisters had done the same when he was growing up, and it was his sisters who could truly make him laugh, who could make him relent instead of fight. 

He reached up and pressed his palm against the side of his head, covering the scars. 

“I’m not done with your haircut you know. Unless you want it to look like a lawnmower went over your head.” 

Mordecai ran his fingertips over the raised scars before removing his hand. He felt incredibly tired, what with the lingering hangover, the lack of sleep, and the long hours ahead for the wedding ceremony. 

He rolled his shoulders and exhaled heavily through his nose. 

“So how’d it happen?” Mitzi asked. She stood on tiptoe to push the hair over his ear. 

“I was being careless,” he answered. 

“That’s all?” 

“Most of it, yes.” 

Mitzi drew back the scissors and shrugged. 

“Atlas will tell me.” The scissors reflected a flicker of sunlight, like an exposed tooth caught on a smiling lip. 

Mordecai kept silent. 

He recollected the memory, but it came in shreds of pain. The longer he thought about it the more his head ached. It was back when he had first been placed under Atlas’s tutelage. His first shootout, first deal gone sour. A delirious vision of a single light shining in his eyes. Someone snapping their fingers in front of his face. A man was there, a looming figure, calling out his name. Someone’s heavy hand placed over Mordecai’s chest, trying to shake him awake. That voice hollering, “He’s been damn near shot, look—” The hand tilting his head, the feeling of something hot and wet sliding down his face and neck, going into his eyes, making his vision go dark red. 

Another voice, “Blasted thieves almost blew his head off.” 

Another shadowy figure lifting him from the ground. The memory had a sound which made his ears ring. 

“Scheisse, it’s loud.” 

“What?” 

Mordecai straightened himself and cleared his throat. His headache began to dull. 

“Nothing. Can you cut that piece off?” He pointed to a stray tuft of hair on the right side of his head. “I have to say, you didn’t do a terrible job. Certainly not professional, but acceptable enough.” 

“Gee. Thanks.” 

Mitzi snuffed out her cigarette into the sink before cutting the final piece. She yawned, putting the scissors down on the sink’s edge. She opened a can of pomade and dipped her fingers inside, working the gel in her palms before smoothing it over his head. 

“My momma didn’t have high hopes. She thought I’d settle on the first man who showed me a shred of affection. Thought I’d get hitched too soon.” 

Her voice went quiet. 

“I guess she was right.” 

She went behind him, smoothing down his hair before resting her interlaced hands on top of his head. She stood like that, studying their reflection. Mordecai felt her weight lean on him, felt her warmth and smelled her perfume. 

There was an awkward hesitation, the quick movement of trying to regain distance between each other. Mordecai stood and turned around, causing her hands to slide down and rest on his shoulders. They looked each other in the eyes, their bodies nearly pressed together, a strangeness saturating the air. They had never been this close before. Mordecai pulled away and Mitzi dropped her hands, her face slightly pink. She exited the bathroom, going to the dresser drawer to pull another cigarette from its case. She lit it and rapidly began to puff at it. She watched as Mordecai put on his glasses. He examined his haircut in the mirror, then leaned against the doorway to face her. 

“What?” she said, miffed. 

“Nothing.” 

Mitzi persisted. 

“What? I thought it turned out fine.” 

Mordecai responded, “It did.” 

Mitzi held onto herself, walking in a slow circle, her wedding dress flowing across the floor. The sound of fabric rustling came from the bathroom. Mordecai rushed out, his shirt and suit jacket draped over his arm. 

He pulled his suspenders over his shoulders, rushing out the door while saying, “I’ll be back in less than an hour.” 

He jostled back into the room, quickly darting into the bathroom before stepping out. 

“The hair on the floor—” 

Mitzi waved her hand. 

“Go on. I got it.” 

As he rushed by, Mitzi could see the white scars on the side of his head— faint, but present, beneath the hair she may have cut too close to the scalp. They looked like the tail end of a comet passing through the night sky of his black hair. 

Mitzi looked down at her wedding dress, at the way it held her like a fog on a riverbank, and she felt the sun’s rays come through the window. 

She took a deep breath. It looked like it wouldn’t rain after all. 

On his way out the door, Mordecai went into the little office, taking the pea shooter from the desk drawer and concealing it within his suit’s breast pocket. 

——————————— 

Mordecai walked through the streets with a superfluous abundance of flowers cradled in his arms, an assortment of daisies, daffodils, and baby’s breath catching the attention of every passerby who had the audacity to congratulate whatever ‘lucky woman’ was going to receive those flowers. 

He kept his line of sight on the chapel, weaving in and out of traffic. 

The crowd near the chapel was thick. Atlas’s boys greeted him enthusiastically, commenting on last night’s escapades. They made note of the pretty dames who had arrived for the wedding, lifting their hands in salutations at the guests and tipping their hats at the ladies. The sun was warming the city and the thunderclouds were long gone over the valley. 

Flecks of pollen stuck to Mordecai’s black suit. He adjusted the bushel of flowers as he entered the chapel, his eyes meeting Atlas’s at the end of the aisle. The chapel was a bustle of guests conversing, hugging, searching for a seat among the pews. 

Mordecai went to Atlas, moving through the crowd. He was already explaining to his employer that the flowers were of the utmost quality before he even said hello, unaware that Atlas had immediately noticed the scars on his scalp, now revealed from his too-short haircut. Atlas bristled, blinked, then once again placed his hand on Mordecai’s shoulder like he had that morning. 

At the front of the chapel, Atlas’s gang of bootleggers— oddballs and runaways and displaced vagabonds— leaned past the entranceway to see Atlas hug Mordecai, something they had never seen him do, and Mordecai, the flowers pressed between the two men, standing wide-eyed and unmoving. He did not return the hug, but stared straight ahead at the stained glass window, the colors casting the young hitman in prisms of spring light. 

——————————— 

The reception after the ceremony took place underground at the Lackadaisy Speakeasy, but such a get-together was reserved for the dedicated nighthawks. The sun went down and Atlas gave the word for the underground passage to be opened. 

Lights glittered among every glass and pearl, on the smiling faces of the party-goers, who came in flocks to congratulate the newly weds. The band riled up the energy of the night with a jazz tune that caroused the dance floor. 

Mordecai kept to the outside of the crowd, standing at attention with his back pressed against the wall. His hangover had dissipated but the memory of alcohol on his tongue made him queasy. Viktor stood behind the bar, helping himself to a shot of vodka every now and then, his bellowing laugh loosening up as he and another compatriot began arm wrestling over the bar. The previous night’s interloper, the peacock, pecked at the ground, flapping its wings when a drunken party-goer tried to pick him up. 

Amidst the crowd, he occasionally saw Mitzi. Her pearl earrings softened the light around her blushing face, the smoke from her cigarette bending to match the movement of the people around her. She was excellent at it, he admitted, entertaining conversation and attracting others to her presence. 

Each time he saw the wedded couple, they had a drink in their hands. Atlas could hold his liquor, Mordecai knew this, but even he seemed to be throwing caution to the wind tonight. 

The peacock swaggered up to the triggerman. They exchanged a glare before it continued on its way, its iridescent plumage glittering like sunlight on ocean waves. 

The night waned on, and Mordecai had nearly fallen asleep in a chair in the corner of the room. He woke, felt for the pea shooter handgun in his breast pocket, then drifted back to sleep. 

When he woke again, the crowd had thinned. The band played something a bit more melancholy, a tune that carried on like idle conversation. Mordecai checked his pocketwatch and saw the hour hand had moved past three a.m. 

He stood, straightening the lapels of his suit, before going through a side hallway to stretch his legs. He walked with his hands in his pockets, his eyes adjusting to the dimness. Up ahead, the speakeasy’s liquor room light was on. The door was cracked open and he assumed one of the bartenders had left the light on. He went towards it to turn off the light but paused when he heard voices speak from inside. 

Carefully, Mordecai moved closer, listening in. 

“You are not naive to this line of work, Mitzi. And neither is he.” 

It was Atlas’s voice, rough and thick from the night’s copious consumption of alcohol. 

“You aren’t listening to me. Rumors float around that he’s…touched in the head from some accident, and then, today of all days, I find out it’s true. Have you even looked at the scars?” 

There was a muffled response. Mordecai peeked in and saw Mitzi’s hands on her hips. The overhead lightbulb cast eerie shadows over the two newly weds. 

“It didn’t affect him the way you think it did.” He added gruffly, but gently, “Mitzi. I think the drinks are giving you a soft heart about this.” 

“Are you…It ain’t about having a soft heart. Atlas, honey, folks talk. And I notice things too. He doesn’t…he doesn’t act normal sometimes. I know you favor him….” 

“He can take care of himself. I’ve been teaching him how to do that for over a year now.” 

“Your little prodigy could have gotten killed.” 

“I wouldn’t have allowed it. _He_ wouldn’t have allowed it either.” 

Mordecai pulled away, his hand automatically going to the scars on the side of his head. 

It was true what he had told Mitzi— he had gotten this wound from being careless— but he hadn’t told her everything, like the fact that he couldn’t remember what had happened to give him those scars. He was somewhere at the wrong time. He wasn’t fast enough. It was a dark room and there were men gathered at a table. He had been leaning against a wall. A shout. A curse. There was pain like a bright flash of lightning hitting a tree. The fire of this world had exploded in front of him, leaving traces of sparks embedded in his skull. The fire had turned him cold. 

Atlas’s low voice continued. 

“Last night when I was having drinks with the boys— well, he had a few too many and told me he’d follow me to the ends of the earth.” He chuckled warmly. Mordecai looked through the door’s crack to see Mitzi smile. 

“I won’t let something like that happen again,” he reiterated, taking Mitzi into his arms and holding her tight. 

So Atlas knew. Mordecai stepped quietly down the corridor, back towards the party. He knew deep down that he could not ask him how it happened. 

He slipped into a bathroom, locked the door, and took off his glasses, placing them on the edge of the sink. He ran the faucet, leaning down to splash cold water on his face. He had not thought of that incident so extensively until now. A steady ring filled his ears, pulling him along like the pluck of a hellish harp string. It reverberated and he could feel his mother’s hands on his head, and then he felt Mitzi’s hands on his neck. If he thought about it for too long, those gentle hands would become violent. A caressing hand could become a choking grasp around his neck. He pulled the hand towel from its rack. He dried the water from his face and studied the array of white scars along his scalp, usually hidden by his thick hair. 

His heart was beating fast. He thought of Mitzi in her pearl colored wedding dress, the veil framing her sad eyes as she sat on the bed. He thought of the letter he had received from his sister Esther just a couple months prior. It informed in neat cursive that his youngest sister Rose had met someone, a young lad about twenty years of age, who would, as Esther put it, ‘ _pester the household come rain or snow just to talk to Rose_.’ The letter claimed they’d be married in the next five years, no doubt about it. 

Mordecai imagined Rose in her wedding gown, curly hair pinned back, her unabashed smile beaming in the sunlight. It made him smile to think about, and then the smile faded when he realized he wouldn’t be there to see it. He hadn’t set foot in New York for so long, and he had no intention to go back, not as long as his face was etched onto hit lists from both the police and the gang members who still had a score to settle, despite Atlas’s intervention to ‘settle grievances’. 

The sleeves of his suit soaking wet, Mordecai shook his hands, disturbed by the fact that something happened he could not remember, distraught that his mother used to run her fingers through his hair, until one day, after the death of his baby sister, his mother couldn’t bear to touch him or his sisters. She had slipped away from him and out the front door, where she sat down on the tenement stairs, hunched over with her head in her hands. Mordecai watched her from the doorway, the grey light heavy and the smell of mildew stinging his eyes and nose. 

The handgun pressed against his heart. As Mordecai stepped into the well-lit speakeasy, his eyes adjusting to the light, he knew he couldn’t ask Atlas what had happened because he was afraid of the answer. 

The peacock stood in the middle of the dance floor. It roused its feathers with a shake before grandly opening its full tail display. The spectacle caused the party’s tired stragglers to ogle. 

Mordecai approached the peacock, its faux eyes staring at him, the wisp of feathers swaying like flowers in a spring breeze.


	2. Chapter 2

**Part Two**  
**Summer, 1922**

He had never felt pain like this before. Yes, he had scrapped before, tussled in the streets and had his fair share of cuts and bruises. Yes, he had been shot in the arm, but that was over a year ago, and that pain had been numbing, almost bearable, and it helped that he had slain the man who had shot him in the first place. At least he could say he came out the winner of that fight, despite the injury, despite the pain. 

But this, it was the crucifixion of all pains. 

“I need you to hold him down.” 

“I am trying!” 

He needed to get away from the pain, but two big, burly hands were weighing him down at the shoulders. The room smelled sickly of iron. Mordecai lurched over the side of the bed and dry-heaved, but his stomach was empty, and the big hands were shoving him onto his back once again. 

“Vhere is morphine?” 

“There is none.” 

Mordecai knew his eyes were wide open, but all he could see was the dizzying light of the bedside lamp. 

There was talk, shouts and voices arguing. Mordecai turned his head to the side and saw a dark figure standing in the doorway, one hand resting on a cane. 

“All’s I’m saying is ya’ll owe me brand new sheets…Hell, make that a whole damn bed.” 

Mordecai blinked, his eyes adjusting to look around him. The heavy Slovak voice of Viktor boomed in a different language. Most definitely a curse, Mordecai thought. The pain seared upwards and he turned on his side to retch. 

He heard the faint voice of Atlas tell the man, “Trust me. You will be compensated greatly.” 

The man walked by him, rubbing his bloodied hands on a towel. He waved off Atlas, touting under his breath, “I know you will May. Sure as hell is hot and the Mississippi wide.” 

Atlas followed the man out the door and down a flight of stairs. 

Mordecai hissed, “Where the hell am I? What’s going on?” 

Viktor barked back, “You feel your side? Look.” 

Mordecai lowered his gaze. His shirt was stained dark at the waist. It glistened wet and he felt it trail down his side and onto his thigh. His eyes adjusted to the light long enough for him to see its crimson color. 

“You vere vhacked. By plywood.” 

Mordecai took shallow breaths, mustering up enough strength to spit out, “Plywood doesn’t do that.” 

“Plywood vith _nail_ sticking out of it, yes.” 

Mordecai tried to sit up, but immediately Viktor put both hands on his shoulders again. 

“Don’t get up.” 

The room spun: he tried locating the source of pain, feeling it start near his waist and gravitate towards his hipbone. Mordecai wriggled his hand down to feel the injury. It was hot and wet. He remembered getting the upper hand during the attack, when two thugs thought they’d be crafty enough to break into Lackadaisy’s storage room. 

Atlas had been warned hours beforehand by an intel source. He sent Mordecai and Viktor to do a stakeout. 

Mordecai thought they had the upper hand, and now— 

The pain seared throughout him, like the prong of a hot iron burning into his flesh. 

He grabbed Viktor by the collar of his shirt, panting, sweat rolling down his forehead. The pain in his side had been from a swift but direct hit by a piece of plywood. 

He clenched his teeth in disbelief. 

A goddamn piece of plywood with a goddamn nail sticking out of it. 

“Where are we?” 

“Old doctor friend of Atlas. Somevhere over river,” Viktor replied. 

Mordecai tensed, his lips pulled back so tightly that he bared his teeth. 

“Goddammit,” Mordecai seethed, “knock me out.” It was not his proudest moment and Viktor’s expression twisted in confusion. 

“Doctor is coming back—” 

“He said, no morphine,” Mordecai interrupted between pants. “Just knock me out, _please_.” 

He had always prided himself on his ability to keep cool, to take the punches with dignity and to deliver an even worse counterattack when the opportunity arose. 

Yet here, feeling the blood leave his body and the nerves fire in erratic direction, Mordecai lost his composure. 

“Vait here,” Viktor commanded. He swiftly left the bedroom, his heavy boots stomping down the stairs. 

Mordecai looked up at the ceiling, at the wooden beams. Wooden beams, wooden pieces put together in a geometrical pattern, the whack of the plywood hitting him right in the gut before tearing him open. Mordecai balled his fists into the bedsheets, demanded calmness to come over. 

Even when he forced himself to remain still, the pain made his legs shake and his breathing to be ragged. 

Alone in the room, Mordecai was afraid to pull up his shirt and look at the injury. The amount of blood he could feel soaking through his shirt and onto the bed made him realize that his innards could very well be coming _out_ , and once again, Mordecai retched, before coughing dryly. 

His countenance fell into a dark determination. If Death were standing in the corner of that bedroom, Mordecai was staring him down, baring his teeth, warning Him to come any closer. 

“Christ on a podium, somebody open the window.” 

Mordecai turned to see the doctor covering his nose with the collar of his shirt. He was a staunch country man, older than Atlas, with a roughness to him that suggested he was a veteran of the Great War. 

“It reeks of blood in here,” he continued, moving a skinny vanity table next to the bed, its attached mirror sending patterns of reflected light all across the room. Mordecai was suddenly mortified to see his reflection looking at him. It looked like someone was choking him, and yet, he could see no hands around his throat. 

The doctor took Mordecai by the wrist, checking his pulse, as Viktor followed close behind. The Slovak went to the window and opened it. The summer breeze rolled into the room. 

Mordecai looked out the window, his eyes adjusting in and out of focus. He swore that the night stars were pulsating in rhythm to the pain in his side. 

“Alright, go on Vasko. Hold him steady.” 

Mordecai’s eyes roamed the room. Atlas was nowhere to be seen. 

“You give ‘em this. Slow but surely.” 

He handed Viktor a clear flask containing gold amber liquid. 

“That’ll put some hair on your chest boy,” the doctor said, folding together two layers of gauze. 

Mordecai blinked. He was being propped up, and the flask was brought to his mouth. When the blood rushed from his head, he blacked out, stuck somewhere between the liquid burning down his throat and a darkness thicker than the night sky. 

Fingers snapped in front of his face. 

“Son, don’t go out just yet. Keep drinking.” 

Mordecai drank, the liquor burning his chest as he swallowed, his sight returning to him. He wished he had stayed in that swell of darkness, because in the next moment he felt something prod at his wound. 

The young man swung his fist, but it was caught by Viktor. The doctor was cutting away his shirt with a pair of surgical scissors. 

Mordecai’s hand dropped from Viktor’s grip. Shaking, he took the flask of brandy and swallowed three big gulps. Not a moment later he took a deep breath and swallowed three more gulps. He handed Viktor the flask and settled his head back on the pillow, the burning in his stomach acidic and sickening before settling into warmth. 

He remembered the hot New York summers of his childhood, how the city could bake under the white disk of a midday sun. Kids would throw buckets of water on each other, tripping and skinning their knees on the rough gravel, dragging baseball bats along the streets as the city pigeons sought shade from the blistering heat. 

He remembered following those black ribbons, the girl with the black ribbons coming loose from her hair, and Mordecai still in knee pants and untucked shirts, believing he had to catch those ribbons when they finally came loose. 

Viktor offered the flask again and Mordecai took it without arguing. He hated it but he was intent on dulling the pain. The country doctor had removed his patient’s shirt and laid his chest and stomach exposed. Despite his fear, Mordecai guzzled the brandy down his throat, and bent his chin down to look at the wound. 

All he saw was a deep red gash, almost black in its center, running from the center of his belly to the edge of his hip. Mordecai traced the flow of pain alongside the wound, until his eyes settled on a white protrusion. His body went cold and he gasped for air. 

The curve of his hipbone was raw and exposed. 

The doctor placed a hand on his chest and pushed him back down on the bed. 

“Lay still. You finished the whole dang bottle, so I reckon yer ‘bout to go out like a light once this’s over.” 

Mordecai tried to think of a story, anything to disconnect his mind from his body. His memories swam alongside each other, and he picked one, any which one, to come forth. He looked into the adjacent mirror, the one attached to the vanity table. Reaching out, Mordecai gave it a thump, causing the mirror to turn on its hinges and face the opposite direction. 

He saw the black ribbons again and closed his eyes shut. 

The apartment in New York had a smell to it that never left his memory. He could pull forth that particular smell like a document from a filing cabinet, relive it as though he’d never left the city. It smelled of iron cookware, a wood burning stove, mold on a rainy day, and vetiver. The vetiver, an earthy smell, sweet like wet grass on a summer day, hung from the kitchen window on thin strings of twine. When it was dry, his mother would burn it to relieve her headaches. He knew those days he needed to stay extra quiet. 

It was summer, the workday just ending and the hot sun setting over the Hudson river. His mother, Tzipporah, was at the kitchen sink washing vegetables for dinner. Through the window she saw the little girl from next door receive a scorning from her father. He pointed down the street, then pointed at his daughter, face red and eyes bulging. The bushes blocked most of the incident from her line of sight, but Zippy could see the little girl storm off down the street, her curly hair loosely held together with a black ribbon. She was close to the same age as Mordecai, who had recently turned thirteen and was practicing his newfound skill of adolescent disobedience. 

Zippy watched as the girl stopped walking to remove a pebble from her shoe. A group of neighborhood boys ran by, pulling at her hair and sticking their tongues out at her. The girl threw her shoe at them before continuing on her way. 

The girl and her father were recent immigrants from Italy. Zippy hadn’t spoken to them personally, but gossip was floating through the neighborhood that the father was a drunkard and the child’s mother had refused to leave Italy, leaving her daughter to be cared for by her irate husband. The little girl was out of control, the neighborhood mothers prattled. She had been caught stealing from the market but was let off with a warning because of her unabashed shameful sobs. 

Zippy let out a deep sigh through her nose. 

“That Capuano man is making his daughter run another errand.” She tutted under her breath. “He yells at her like a street dog.” 

She looked over her shoulder at Mordecai, who sat at the dining table, his legs propped on the chair, a journal open in his lap. He wrote in neat cursive letters with his favorite fountain pen, a black and gold variety which glided beautifully over the paper. It had been a gift from his mother, and one that he used almost religiously. 

“Mordecai, can you walk with her? I don’t like seeing that girl go on her own.” 

Mordecai flipped the page in his journal. 

“She can handle herself,” he said without looking up. 

He felt his mother’s eyes bore into him. He exclaimed, “She can’t even speak English! What am I supposed to say to her?” 

His mother tapped her finger against the kitchen counter, one hand on her hip. She walked over to Mordecai, gave his shoulder a firm squeeze, her eyes both gentle and stern. 

Sighing, Mordecai closed his journal, placing the fountain pen into his shirt’s front pocket. He slid off the kitchen chair and went out the front door, jogging down the three flights of tenement stairs. 

The heat enveloped him as he stepped out the building’s door. It rose from the pavement like an oven cooker, baking the city-dwellers as they traveled along the sidewalk. Idle chatter in all different languages could be heard— men sitting on the steps of their tenements, smoking rolled cigarettes and sipping from bottles hidden inside brown paper bags—women talking in Yiddish, coming home from the synagogue just a few blocks away. 

Mordecai slipped past a slow moving couple, picking up pace to catch up to the little girl. A few voices called out to him in German, asking where the little Heller boy was going in such a hurry. 

He meant to answer them, but he was losing sight of the girl. He strained his line of sight to follow those black ribbons. 

The boy rounded a corner, dodging a horse and buggy, before ramming straight into the girl. Mordecai fell onto his backside as the girl towered over him. 

“Perché mi stai seguendo?” she demanded, enunciating her words with her hands. 

Mordecai regained his footing. A pair of young women who had seen the incident giggled, covering their mouths with their hands. Mordecai’s face reddened. 

“Stupido,” the girl muttered. She turned on her heel and continued on her way. 

Mordecai sneered, fully intent on going back home, when he saw that the girl was holding his favorite fountain pen in her hand. 

His mouth gaped wide open before he stammered, “You little…you little _thief_.” 

The girl looked over her shoulder, and took off at a sprint when she saw the Jewish boy running towards her. 

She weaved in and out of traffic, her dress billowing over her knees, rushing past horses and carts and honking automobiles, past the shouts of men and the gasps of women. The girl dodged a high-drawn carriage before sidestepping into an alley. She thought she had given the boy the slip, but he had followed her close. He blocked the entranceway to the alley. 

Mordecai adjusted his glasses, stepping towards her, and panted, “Give that back to me. _Now_.” 

The girl was about to relent and hand the pen back to its owner when from behind Mordecai came a voice. 

“Look who it is.” 

Mordecai startled, turning around to see several dark silhouettes standing at the entrance of the alley. It was a group of neighborhood boys who stuck together like glue. They had formed an alliance based on mutual dislike for smartasses and thieves, both of which were present in the forms of Mordecai Heller and the little Italian immigrant. 

“Knocking out two birds with one stone. Heller, we’ve not finished our last fight. And you little girl, stole a silver coin off my pal Santino.” 

The biggest boy of the group cracked his knuckles. 

“Dumb luck to be caught like rats in a barrel.” 

Mordecai scoffed, “It’s ‘caught like _fish_ in a barrel’, dimwit.” 

“Piss off kike.” The boys laughed. Mordecai’s eyes narrowed. 

“What? Your momma didn’t teach you that saying?” 

Mordecai pushed his glasses up his nose. He made his hands into fists but his whole body shook with fear. Before he could charge at them, two hands grabbed his shirt sleeve and pulled. The Italian girl yanked him back, leading him further into the alley, and without thinking, Mordecai followed her as the gang of boys yelled, “ _Get them_!” 

The girl turned a sharp corner down a narrower alley. She barely slowed her pace as she dropped to the ground and burrowed under a dilapidated piece of lumber leaning against a building. Mordecai followed suit, getting on his knees and elbows and crawling under the lumber. The entrance opened into a small crevice in the building’s wall, big enough for the two to crouch shoulder to shoulder. They stayed completely still, holding their breath, listening for the steps of their pursuers. 

The boys yelled for them to come out, then they began yelling at each other for letting their victims get away so easily. One boy suggested that they take to the streets again and search there. The arguing ceased, the sounds of their footsteps diminishing as they left the alleyway. 

Mordecai and the girl did not move until it was completely quiet. 

After a minute, the girl crawled out from the crevice, peeking from behind the trash and lumber to see if the coast was clear. 

Mordecai crawled out too, wrinkling his nose at the grime now covering his hands and knees. 

“I suppose that was easier than fighting,” he mumbled, picking a piece of rotten fruit off his shirt. 

The girl eyed him, then handed him the fountain pen. 

Mordecai locked eyes with her, then took the pen, securing it in his front pocket once more. 

“You know, you really shouldn’t steal things. It won’t turn out in your favor, I guarantee it.” 

The girl stood there, staring at him. There was a strange gentleness to her that was overshadowed by a lock-jawed, rigid posture. She was somewhat bug-eyed, and the dark circles under her eyes matched the brown of her eyes, so dark that he could barely distinguish between her iris and pupil. An expression on her face suggested that the world was no mystery to her; in fact, it seemed as though she had an explanation for the way the world was stored deep in her unwavering eyes. 

She extended a tan-colored hand and said, “Esta.” 

Mordecai hesitated, then extended his own hand, replying, “Mordecai.” 

They began to walk out of the alley and into the last light of sunset, when Esta tapped Mordecai on the shoulder. He turned to see her holding a dead rat by the tail. 

Mordecai yelped, taking off at a run as fast as his legs could carry him. 

——————————— 

He remembered walking with her every now and then, but never feeling as though he were obligated to walk with her. He hated how the little Italian girl would show him dead rats in the street just to get a reaction from him, or she would ball her fists up like a boxer, feigning a fight in front of his face as they went for walks down to the pier, or how she didn’t comb her hair, so the ribbons became knotted in a nest of curls. 

That was how it was for awhile. Once the city cooled at sundown, they’d walk to the pier towards the Eastside, usually in silence since neither of them spoke each other’s language. They sat on the dock, witnessing the last of the tugboats come into the harbor, the seagulls which laughed in airy swells, the incoming breeze lifting them high and higher. 

He realized he liked it— the company, the quietness, the fact that he didn’t feel pressured to talk or be charming. The girl was the opposite of charm— he noted this as she spat a loogie into the East River— but in a way, it didn’t bother him, perhaps because she was also very distant, and would tease but only to a certain extent, before returning to aloof indifference. 

There were red imprints on her arm, like somebody had wrung her arm too forcefully. He noticed these as she worked a braid into her hair. He wondered if one of the neighborhood boys had done that to her, or if it was her father. Word was passing along that he was a loose cannon, a man sick on the bottle. 

Mordecai thought about asking, but he stopped himself before he could. She wouldn’t understand the language, and besides, what business was her personal life to him anyway? 

The summer of his thirteenth year, Mordecai Heller began working as a bookkeeper deep in the heart of the Bowery. The boss of the establishment, Mr. Giovanni Rossi, was a man with a clean cut face and an even sharper New York accent. He had procured a lucrative stake in all manner of business, from rigging horse races, to counterfeiting foreign money, to smuggling booze from the south Atlantic. Rossi thought it was some joke that his accountant, an Irishman named Patrick, wanted to take Mordecai on as his assistant. 

But the accountant and the boss soon came to realize that the kid was a whiz at math, and more than that, he was gifted with a knack for strategy. Within his first week he had made a financial plan which would insure their enterprise a double in profits for the next year. 

The numbers added up. Mordecai was put to work, sometimes at a desk, sometimes as an errand boy. 

By summer’s end, Mordecai knew the city like the back of his hand— perhaps better than the back of his hand, since he didn’t have time to memorize each and every line in his hand, just like he didn’t have time to sit down and eat a proper meal. This made his mother inordinately testy, to the point that she had to hold him by the collar and force him to sit down and eat breakfast before leaving the apartment. 

More than that, the men at the business were teaching him to fight, to stand up for himself. He found their manners to be abhorrent, but there was a certain art to the gang that he couldn’t deny, a kind of violence that both excited and concerned him. He sparred with some of the older boys employed there, but they went easy on him. 

_You’re too damn skinny_ , they teased, pushing imaginary glasses up their noses as they smoked cigarettes in nothing but their undershirts and trousers. Their teenaged faces were brimming with acne and sparse stubble, and Mordecai wondered when, or if, that would happen to him. Throughout the workday he dodged their grappling hands and sidestepped their extended feet trying to trip him. 

As summer edged into autumn, Mordecai spent less time with Esta. He hadn’t seen her for awhile until one evening when he was walking back home after the long workday. The heat of the city had swelled up like the crest of a wave hanging over their heads, a reminder that summer hadn’t finished just yet. Mordecai had just rounded the street corner of his neighborhood when he saw Mr. Capuano, Esta’s father, stumbling down the steps of his tenement building. His face was blazingly red and the artery in his neck bulged with each shout. Esta was darting down the steps. His massive hand reached out and grabbed the girl by the arm, shaking her while shouting in Italian. 

Mordecai’s gait faltered for a moment, and then he picked up pace. A crowd had slowed near the scene, a few witnesses cursing at the man to settle down. 

Mr. Capuano’s hand raised, intent to slap his daughter, when Mordecai came upon him, his head and heart drained of all blood as he swiped at the man’s face, his nails scratching in a quick downward stroke. 

He couldn’t believe he had done that, and neither could Mr. Capuano. The man stumbled backwards, falling onto the steps as Esta broke free of his grip and began running. 

Mordecai felt lightheaded, but instinct told him to run. He took off down the street, past his home, past the shops and bakery until a hand reached out and grabbed him by his shirtsleeve. 

He halted. His eyes met Esta’s piercing gaze. She nodded at him, then walked towards the pier. 

Mordecai was still in a frazzled state of mind, the adrenaline in his blood making him jumpy, checking all around them as Esta marched down the street. The sun was behind them, and they walked together in the cool shade of the buildings. 

She was always quiet, but this was a different kind of quiet, like the calm right before a storm. Her shoulders were hunched and her fists were balled at her sides. 

When they reached the pier, Esta paced to and fro before screaming out into the open water. The waves rocked against the pier. They answered her in swells, elusive in their wake, a motion of water moving towards the great Atlantic, and beyond that, to be carried into the ends of the earth. 

She screamed until her voice gave out, and then she squatted, wrapping her arms around her knees. 

Mordecai sat down, dropping his legs over the edge of the pier. His eyes looked up to see the wisps of pink and orange clouds converge into sunset. He said nothing about her continuous sniffles— he didn’t know what to say. He had never been good at handling other people’s emotions, nor was he any better at consoling those emotions. 

The salty breeze brushed over them both, ruffling through their hair, their clothes, cooling the sweat stuck to their bodies. The water splashed rhythmically against the pier. 

He hadn’t time that summer to think about it, but now he felt older, as though he understood the weight of life that he and others carried. Gingerly he reached out, placing his palm on Esta’s shoulder like his mother would do when there was nothing more to say. 

When she had wiped the tears from her face, Esta stood, tilting her chin to look out beyond the horizon. 

The hard look of determination had returned. She extended a hand and helped Mordecai stand back on his own feet. 

They began making their way back towards the neighborhood. The rush of the city had slowed— folks were going for strolls, apartment windows were open, allowing the smell of supper to waft along the late summer air. 

Mordecai felt his stomach tighten, and a sudden gratitude filled his heart when he thought about his mother at home, placing a meal on the dinner table, his sisters pestering him about what he’d done that day as they set the silverware around the plates. 

Esta suddenly hooked her arm around his, turning them both full circle until they were facing each other. He thought she was going to try to show him another dead rat in an alleyway, but the girl’s eyes were locked onto his and would not let go. Her face was beet red, her bottom lip trembling, and her expression looked as though she were about to tell him terrible news. 

She leaned forward quickly, forcefully kissing him on the mouth. 

Mordecai flinched back, his heart stopping and starting in arrhythmical beats. He took off his glasses, his hand shaking. They stared at each other wordlessly. 

Esta backed away, before shouldering past him and taking off at a run. 

It wasn’t until she had let go that Mordecai realized her hands had been grasping at his waist, right near his hipbone. 

He blinked, dazed, confused as to what had just happened. 

From across the street, the gang of older boys who frequently sought to torment him began to hoot and holler. They had seen the exchange and were now mocking him. They puckered their lips and blew kisses at Mordecai, a few of them batting their eyes and swooning into a hedge of bushes. 

Mordecai felt anger rise forth from a place deep in his gut. He wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt, then stormed towards the group of boys. Without hesitation he drew back his fist and knocked the tallest boy down. The group froze in disbelief, before shouting expletives and tumbling on top of the bespectacled boy. 

It was a whirlwind of motion, boy upon boy, fists thrown and dust rising from where the pack of bodies grabbed, shoved, and kicked. 

Mordecai swung wildly, blindly, before being overpowered and driven down, the back of his head meeting the ground with a hard and forceful crack. 

——————————— 

Tzipporah Heller unlocked the front door to her apartment, her arms cradling a loaf of challah bread and a bottle of wine covered in navy blue embroidered cloth. She wore a shawl over her shoulders, a slight chill in the air that morning that signaled the first sign of autumn. 

Hanging the shawl on a hook by the front door, Zippy placed the challah and wine on the kitchen counter. Quietly she strode through the apartment, careful to avoid any creaking planks. She crossed her arms, leaning against the entranceway to the family parlor. 

Mordecai was sound asleep on the sofa, and had been for the past fourteen hours. The bruise around his eye had blackened, the area surrounding his cheekbone colored blue and purple. Specks of red dotted his face where the blood vessels had been broken, and a nasty cut near his bottom lip had scabbed dark red. Zippy entered the parlor, sat on the edge of the sofa, and stroked his cheek. He did not move, save for the gentle rise and fall of his torso as he breathed. 

When he had come home last night, battered and beaten, his mother had led him straight to the sofa while his sisters followed close behind, demanding to know what had happened. 

She hushed them, telling the girls to retrieve a pillow from the adjacent bedroom. They did, and she propped the pillow under his head. Mordecai began to speak, trying to lift himself up on shaky arms, but Zippy made him lay back down. She removed his glasses, now cracked at the lens, and laid them on the rickety surface of the sewing machine treadle. 

Tzipporah had prepared a hot bath for her son, then left him alone to clean off the blood and dust. She did not chastise him, only working deliberately and calmly as she rummaged through the kitchen cabinet in search of pain relief. 

When Mordecai returned to the sofa, she gave him one tablespoon of cough syrup to put him to sleep. 

Now in the morning’s grey light, Zippy placed her hand gently on her son’s chest. Outside, the clouds had covered today’s Shabbat as a blanket covers a sleeping child. It called for rest. She recalled how quickly this summer had past, and how Mordecai was growing out of childhood and into a world far less forgiving than the home she had made for her family. 

She had already lost a daughter two years prior, and now she felt as though she were losing her only son. 

Zippy removed her glasses, wiped at her eyes, then placed her glasses back on her nose. She stepped into the kitchen, the quiet clatter of the kitchen cabinets echoing throughout the apartment as she began the morning meal. 

Mordecai opened his eyes, hearing the faint sound of the wood fire stove crackling, before his eyes fluttered closed, the smell of warm iron causing his nose to itch and redden. 

——————————— 

Mordecai didn’t see Esta before she was taken away. His mother had sentenced him to house arrest as punishment for street fighting, and as such, wasn’t there to see Esta be taken away. He was told by his mother that a group of women had heard of Mr. Capuano’s abuse and went to the apartment to take the girl from the home. 

Allegedly, he had been resistant at first. But the women, explaining themselves through an Italian-speaking translator, assured him that the girl would be happier and well-fed with them. 

The story went that they told him she desperately needed a mother, and after that, his entire demeanor changed. He relented, and allowed his daughter to be taken to the other side of the city, to be raised in the household of another family. 

Mordecai was still coming off the pain medicine when his mother told him this. Groggily, he went out the apartment, going down the tenement stairs before exiting through the building’s front door. He was still in his pajamas as he blinked against the sunlight, looking out across the street, his black eye still swollen. 

Mr. Capuano was leaving his apartment. He locked the door, peering out from under his workmen’s cap. Three red scratches ran down the length of his face. 

Mordecai slipped back inside. He rested his forehead against the door and sighed. His whole body ached as he walked up the three flights of stairs into his family’s apartment. 

From within the parlor room he heard his sisters quarreling. Esther huffed, “You cut it off too short!” 

Mordecai walked by them, intent on going back to bed. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Rose holding up a pair of scissors. Esther held up a length of black ribbon, stating once more, “Look at it! You ruined it!” 

——————————— 

Mordecai smelled vetiver when he woke up. It was still dark outside and his whole body ached terribly, the pain in his side now a thrumming pulse like the ticking of a clock. 

He reached down and felt stitches there, thick and coarse. It felt positively grotesque, and he wondered what kind of scar would become a part of him after the healing was done. 

The phantom smell of vetiver left the room. Using what strength he had to prop himself up, Mordecai listened for any familiar voice in the house. He was alone in the bedroom. A glass of water was on the bedside table and he gulped it down. He felt as though he were dying of thirst, so he shimmied his legs over the bed, lifting himself until he was sitting up. The movement made his breath hitch, the stitches tugging in odd ways that made him feel like a puppet tangled in its own marionette strings. 

He saw the blurry shape of his glasses on the table, but upon picking them up, he saw that the lens had been shattered. 

The triggerman sat there with his glasses in his hand, his head lowered, trying to catch his breath when a solemn voice spoke from the doorway. 

“I spoke with Viktor. He gave me his side of the story. I want to hear your side as well.” 

Mordecai lifted his head to see Atlas, his silhouette dark against the already dim light of the room. His cane was pressed under his arm, his hand resting in the lapel of his suit jacket. From where he sat on the bed, Mordecai could hear the ticking of his employer’s pocketwatch. 

“We staked out the area, caught the perpetrators, stealing—” 

Mordecai swallowed. It hurt to speak. His mouth stuck together, tacky and dehydrated. 

“I made the first move. Viktor followed promptly. We had the upper hand, but I suppose…I suppose I was blindsided. I, I’m sor—” 

Atlas raised his hand. Mordecai halted. 

“Viktor said your attacker had fifty pounds on you, perhaps even more. And yet, you still charged at him.” 

Mordecai looked down at his broken glasses, his reflection fragmented in several odd, misshapen duplicates of his face. 

“You need to pick your fights more carefully.” 

From a dark corner of the room Atlas brought forth a pitcher of water. He filled the empty glass and with a nod Mordecai drank it. 

“Don’t die on me,” Atlas said as he left the room. He glanced over his shoulder and said with a slight chuckle, “Mitzi would never forgive me for it.” 

With that, Mordecai was alone in the room. He poured another glass of water and drank, then laid back down on the bed, the jolts of pain coming in waves, splashing against his side, against his hipbone. 

He opened his eyes and saw through the years, the ramshackle apartment of his childhood, the employer he eventually cheated at his own game, the fleeting summer of his thirteenth year when he learned there was no room for hesitation in a fight. It was kill or be killed, simple as that. 

The scream of that little Italian girl carrying itself over the water. 

The tug of hands on his waist, holding onto where his hipbones protruded, trying to keep his wound from bleeding out. The gentle placement of small hands on his hips, fingers grazing over the makeshift belt of scratchy twine he used to keep his trousers from falling. The force of the kiss, the force of the plywood nail entering his body, the embarrassment electrifying every nerve, the rage sending him over the edge and firing a bullet into the skull of his attacker. 

Mordecai put his hand over the wound, remembering how terrifying it had been to be touched there. 

To watch the sunset once more, to sleep, to dream… 

incessantly the to and fro motion as the world swam..the only thing tethering him to the earth was the pain. 

He closed his eyes, falling asleep to the sound of water rocking against a boat going down the Mississippi, that River hiding anything and everything deep within its murky water.


	3. Chapter 3

**Part Three**  
**Winter, 1920**

It was like Broadway, but smaller. 

He mumbled this aloud to the woman in the dark room. He mumbled something else, he wasn’t sure what, but it made her halt in her movements, one hand on her hip. 

“I’m aware,” she said. “Now hold still.” 

“Naturally,” Mordecai countered. The morphine made him feel like a leaf floating downstream. He craned his neck to look at his shoulder. Tendrils of blood flowed down his arm and onto the steel surgical table. 

Mordecai’s tongue felt loose in his mouth as he asked, “How many have died here?” 

The woman, her blonde hair pulled back into a bun, a sternness to her gaze, wiped clean a pair of tweezers. 

“This is a funeral home. They usually come to us already dead.” 

Mordecai’s eyes fluttered closed as he nodded his head. An acceptable answer. 

He pointed out the lights again. They shined through the tempered glass, a mosaic of soft gold illuminating the house. 

The woman, Elsa Arbogast, looked at them too. 

“Hmm. The Christmas lights,” she stated. She leaned in, her breath tickling Mordecai’s arm as she slipped the tweezers into the wound to retrieve the first bullet fragment. He felt pressure in his arm as the foreign object was pulled out. Elsa immediately pressed a cloth soaked in antiseptic onto the wound. 

“I’ve never been shot before, I don’t…think…” he mumbled. 

Elsa made a noise of discontent in the back of her throat. 

“Well, as long as you’re in this line of work—” she dropped the bullet fragment into a metal dishpan, “—then I would get used to it. It baffles me how greed could cause such bloodshed. But then again, I saw what happened during the War.” 

She wiped the tweezers again. The handkerchief was smeared with blood. 

“It’s amazing what men will do, all for the sake of money.” 

Mordecai winced, the tweezers digging further into his arm, this time too close to the muscle. 

His head still swimming, he replied, “It’s not always about the money.” 

The sound of the bullet rolling in the dishpan. His eyes caught a shadowy movement from behind the tempered glass, the figure of a man walking by like a specter of yesteryear. Chills went up and down Mordecai’s spine. 

“Oh? Then why do you do it?” Elsa asked. 

Mordecai’s head rolled back to face the ceiling. He was going to answer, but exhaustion kept him from opening his mouth. 

He was going to say, 

_Loyalty_. 

Mordecai’s hand reached for his pocketwatch, but he could not find it. 

——————————— 

In the Winter of 1913, Mordecai Heller began playing a dangerous game with his employer. He had worked for the man for over a year, and he was getting screwed over ten ways ’til Sunday by Mr. Giovanni Rossi, and Mordecai was determined to get the better of him. 

A few nickels here, a quarter there, and eventually, whole bills began going from Mr. Rossi’s account into Mordecai’s pockets. 

He felt reason enough. The boss was deducting his pay and didn’t suspect the little runt to retaliate. Didn’t think he had a deceptive bone in his body, since he was always so meticulous and objective about the payroll every time the month rolled around. 

Plus, the kid never smiled. Not that a sullen attitude meant he was trustworthy, but it certainly didn’t mean he wasn't putting on airs to butter up the boss. 

Mordecai used his coldness to his benefit, but he still felt as though a gun was being held to the back of his head every time he took a little out of Rossi’s account. 

To worsen matters, Mordecai Heller, gangly and awkward at fourteen years old, a worried expression constantly etched onto his face, was finding himself sleeping on the streets. He didn’t _want_ to sleep on the streets, but he forced himself. 

One night, despite the bitter December cold, Mordecai slept in Central Park, wearing three layers of socks on both his hands and feet, bundling himself up in a blanket that he’d been carrying around in his satchel. He sat huddled on a park bench, plumes of smoke coming from his mouth as he drifted into sleep. 

He avoided going home because his father was dying. 

It had been happening for sometime now, a slow and arduous process that had gotten significantly worse that winter. Now his father laid in bed, unable to eat, unable to speak, wasting away, reaching out for someone to hold to his hand— 

Mordecai jerked awake, his teeth chattering and body shaking so forcefully that he nearly fell over. 

It was too cold, far too cold to sleep. Mordecai felt a speck of wetness fall on his nose. He looked up and saw the first faint flurries of snow. They were illuminated by the streetlight. The world was eerie and silent. He felt incredibly alone. 

Standing up, Mordecai rolled the blanket tightly, shoving it into his satchel, before walking briskly down the path. 

It would be a long walk, about an hour or so before he arrived; but the cold drove him forward, the rhythm of his shoes clacking against the pavement telling him that time was running out. 

He wasn’t sure he wanted to be there, he wasn’t sure he would be able to stay, but he continued to walk towards his father’s deathbed knowing he’d be there, waiting. 

——————————— 

Isaac Heller used to be one of the hardest working men on the Eastside. He was a busybody, constantly going from one project to the next. He worked dangerous jobs on top of skyscrapers or below in the sewers, and when he came home, worked his hands bloody helping folks in the neighborhood with their own dilapidated tenements. 

He only spoke English around his children, his thick German accent garnishing each and every word. He rarely showed affection, but would ruffle Mordecai’s head when his son had something to tell him: a fact he had learned at school, a recitation of a book he had read, a breathless presentation of his multiplication tables. 

Isaac had a dour deadpan sense of humor, never took himself too seriously, and was not surprised in the slightest when something bad happened. 

When the neighborhood tenements were falling apart, Isaac Heller refused to be complacent. He teamed together with a faction of carpenters, plumbers, and electricians to try to put the buildings back together on their own. 

It was a long process, seemingly futile, but they pressed on. In 1910, his wife Tzipporah gave birth to their fourth child, a baby girl they named Hannah. 

It was near a week after her birth that he set back to work on a building just a twenty minute walk from his home. The men at the site offered their congratulations, each one taking turns to sip from a flask before starting the long workday. Isaac felt warmth in his heart at the thought of returning to his family that day. 

The men at the site didn’t see exactly what had happened, but they heard it nonetheless. There was a loud crash, the sound of metal pipes ricocheting off the concrete floor. 

They found Isaac lying on the ground unconscious, a thin trail of blood trickling from his nose. 

He couldn’t get out of bed for weeks. When he woke up, he could barely talk, so instead he would communicate through pen and paper, but eventually his hand began to shake too much, turning his writing into an illegible mess. His vision had left him, and his once green eyes turned a milky-jade color. 

Mordecai remembered taking a family portrait on the front steps of the tenement building, the snow still covering the ground. He held his sister Rose’s hand while Esther leaned against the railing. His mother stood by the door, baby Hannah in her arms. He tried to maintain eye contact with the large camera shutter in front of them, the photographer gesturing at them to keep still, but Mordecai’s eyes trailed up to the third story window. Inside, his father was laying in bed, sick with something the boy did not understand. 

Rose fidgeted before squatting down to play in the snow. Mordecai refocused his attention to the camera and the bulb flashed white. 

During that winter, Hannah died. It became an unspoken rule in the household to not say her name. 

One night, Mordecai heard crying come from the bedroom adjacent to the parlor room. He left the bed, the one he shared with Esther and Rose, and tiptoed into the parlor, keeping himself hidden in the shadows. 

His mother was sitting on the edge of the bed, her head in her hands, her muffled sobs coming in waves. 

It frightened him to hear the sound. He had never heard or seen his mother cry before. Distraught, Mordecai gripped the front of his shirt with his small hands, unsure of what to do. 

His father was lying in the bed, his weak hand trembling as it reached for his wife’s hand. 

She took her husband’s hand and began speaking softly in German. Mordecai strained to hear what she was saying, but it was too quiet and there were words he didn’t fully recognize. 

“ _Dich verlieren_ …” Losing you. 

“ _Unsere Kinder_ …” Our children. 

“ _Wie werden wir überleben_?” How will we survive. 

Mordecai retreated, slipping into the back bedroom where he crawled into bed next to his sisters. 

“Ugh, what are you doing?” Esther mumbled. Her eyes were still closed as she pulled the blanket closer. 

“Nothing. Go back to sleep,” Mordecai whispered. 

He laid awake for the rest of the night, looking out the window into the winter night sky. The stars seemed brighter in the cold, as though the frost preserved them in a single place and time. 

The worry moved through his mind like a runaway train. 

_How will we survive_? 

He thought of his father, how strong and capable he used to be, now withering away in a bed. Mordecai lifted his hands from under the blanket and looked at them. They were small, but they could grow to be like his father’s hands. 

Mordecai couldn’t sleep, but he did dream—the terrifying present and the uncertain future met like a picture show, silent black and white images flashing across his mind, and in them, streaks of blood coloring the world red. 

——————————— 

He couldn’t build a skyscraper, but he could strategize numbers, and for that, Mordecai Heller became the youngest accountant Giovanni Rossi had ever employed. 

The boy had a certain desperation to him when he was hired. Lots of folks did— but Rossi could tell this wasn’t just about the money. The kid had someone to take care of, and by God, he worked himself ragged to do it. Rossi almost felt sorry for making Heller his own personal errand boy as well as his accountant, but a living was a living, and he actually began congratulating himself for teaching the youth a thing or two about hard work. 

He had no idea that little by little, bit by bit, his account was being siphoned— by none other than the quiet kid with the glasses. 

It had been three years since his father’s stroke, and Mordecai Heller had become no stranger to cunning opportunism. 

Mordecai made his way down the Bowery, cutting through dark alleys and jumping chainlink fences as the bitter cold pushed him along. His hands and feet were numb. He kept his arms crossed over his chest, noticing the lights in the building windows, wondering what went on behind closed doors for the millions of people in this city. He thought fondly how tonight was the last night of Hanukkah; then, he thought with a sick feeling in his stomach that he had missed every night of Hanukkah with his family that year. 

When he made it to his street, he nearly turned around, thinking another night out in the cold wouldn’t be that bad. 

He was close enough to see the dark silhouette of his mother in his parents’ bedroom. The light from within glowed golden. The menorah stood displayed in the bedroom window. It had not been lit yet. 

Mordecai took a deep breath, and went up the steps into the tenement. The hall was freezing cold. His breath plumed in the air as he ascended the stairs up to the third floor. Hesitant, but deciding he might as well do it, the teenager knocked on the door of his family’s apartment. 

Tzipporah opened the door. Her eyes adjusted to the light, and at seeing her son, she put her hand over her heart. White snowflakes were stuck in his black hair. His nose was red and dark circles were under his eyes. He shivered, and Tzipporah ushered him inside, speaking softly to both him and herself in Yiddish. Mordecai put his satchel on the floor, taking his shoes and coat off, listening as his mother continued speaking. 

She did this when she was anxious, ever since he was a little kid. The language was calming, soothing, a sound embedded deep in his bones that always brought him home. 

“Come,” she said, returning to English. “Sit by the fire.” 

She stoked the flames in the wood-fire stove with an iron prong, sending the smell of smoke throughout the kitchen. 

Mordecai lowered himself by the fire, holding his knees against his chest. 

His mother began heating a kettle on the stove. Her dress brushed over him. It smelled of vetiver and lavender, dust and the homely smell of latkes. 

He wanted so badly to apologize to her, even if what he had done wasn’t wrong. He eyed the satchel laying next to the door. 

“You’ll catch your death out there,” she said bluntly. 

Mordecai rubbed his hands and held them close to the fire. 

“Where are Rose and Esther?” he asked. 

“Next door with Miss Itzkowitz,” she answered, cleaning out a mug with a dishrag. Her movements were clipped, her voice sharp. 

Mordecai could tell she was upset, more than likely at him. 

“Why?” 

Zippy checked the kettle, then said, “It’s hard on them to be in the apartment right now. Your father…” 

Her voice wavered, then trailed off. She busied herself with preparing a meal of bread and cheese. 

Mordecai’s heart skipped a beat. He swallowed, holding in closer to himself. 

He stared into the fire. The flames danced and licked inside an iron stomach, a mini hell contained within the home. If he could have given the fire a voice, it would have been the big, desolate voice of the Old Testament— every word a final verdict, heavy as a stone slab weighing you down for eternity. Mordecai glanced to the side. 

A mere few feet away, just around the corner, his father was lying in bed dying. 

The truth was that Mordecai had been carrying resentment in his heart— resentment that his father had been brought to weakness, that his mother had to work herself ragged to feed the family, that the conditions of the tenement building were poor and dangerous. He dug his nails into his arms. 

His father couldn’t help becoming ill, and yet, an ugly voice inside Mordecai’s head blamed him, not just for the sickness, but for their poverty, their hunger, the loss of baby Hannah— 

Mordecai’s wide eyes looked over the rim of his glasses. The vision of the flames converged and melted into a single organism, an animal which breathed and waited for one accident, one slip-up, so it could break free and destroy everything in its path. 

The kettle shrieked, and Mordecai was jolted out of the vision. His mother removed the kettle, pouring the hot water into the mug. The steam of dandelion chamomile perforated the smoky air. 

She stooped down, handing Mordecai the mug. From over the rim of her glasses she looked at him, speaking, “You need to say goodbye to your father.” 

She rose, putting her hand on his back. 

“I am going to go next door to Miss Itzkowitz’s.” She wrapped the bread and cheese into a cloth. “I am leaving you two alone.” 

Mordecai nodded. He looked into the teacup to see the ripples of fiery light reflect back at him. 

Tzipporah rubbed his back once before leaving with the food. The front door closed shut with a click. 

Mordecai sipped at his tea for a minute. He decided that what he had to do could be handled like business. He would go into that bedroom and he would say goodbye. He would be stronger and braver than he had ever been, and his words would be convincing and professional. 

Setting the mug on the kitchen table and adjusting the sleeves of his sweater, Mordecai marched into the bedroom, pulling back the curtain which separated it from the parlor room. 

An oil lamp on the bedside table illuminated the room. Its weak light cast the room in deep, stifling shadows. On the bed his father, Isaac Heller, laid with his hands on top of each other, his head propped up on several pillows. His eyes were closed. Mordecai felt the blood drain from his face because for a moment he thought his father had already passed. 

The floorboard creaked and Isaac opened his eyes. Blind, but still able to hear, he reached, waiting for whoever was in the room to take hold of his hand. 

Mordecai went to the other side of the room to look out the window where the menorah had been placed. Outside, the snow was falling gently in the darkness. In the glass window he could see his reflection, and then his eyes focused to see Isaac's reflection. The man's head was turned, his unseeing eyes steadily fixed on Mordecai. 

“I…I don’t have much to say,” Mordecai began. “I just want you to know that I will take care of the family.” He lowered his voice, his fists clenched. “I swear on it.” 

Isaac patted the bed. Mordecai approached warily, sitting down at the foot of the bed and watching his father from over his shoulder. Isaac felt for the bedside table next to him. He opened the drawer, rummaging through it, before bringing out a dreidel. 

Mordecai immediately recognized the dreidel from when he was a kid. His father had carved it from butternut wood and painted it blue and gold. 

Isaac made a motion with his shaky hands. Mordecai stood and scooted the bedside table closer so that it stood between them. 

Sitting down closer, he saw his father smile, the corner of his mouth sagged from where his face had been paralyzed. 

He spun the dreidel on the table. 

When it landed, Mordecai said, “Nisht.” 

His father nodded, then handed the dreidel to Mordecai. The teenager blurted, “I…do I need to get something for the winner…” He recalled playing the game with his sisters when they were little, putting acorns and pennies and candy into the winner’s pot. 

Isaac shook his head, waving his hand. 

Mordecai spun the dreidel. It landed on _Shin_. 

“Shtel,” he said. As he placed the dreidel into his father’s hands, he eyed the satchel in the far corner of the apartment. It took great effort, as the tremor in Isaac’s hand made it hard for him to steady the dreidel on its point. Mordecai took hold of his father’s thin arm gently, steadying him so he could spin it. The oil lamp's light cast dark shadows. 

It landed, and Mordecai declared it “Nisht” once more. 

This went back and forth for a few turns. In the near silence Mordecai could hear the fire crackle, the neighbors talking through the walls, and the faint ticking of a clock, but he could not figure out where it was coming from. He felt an increasing urgency to tell his father about what he had done, how he was frightened by the possibility of getting caught. His father’s unwavering blind eyes bore into him. 

The dreidel landed on _Gimel_ — Mordecai thought he heard Isaac’s long-ago, strong voice come from his throat as he said aloud, “Gantz.” 

Gimel. 

_Everything_. 

Swiftly he stood, his heart pounding, the bile in his stomach churning. He went to the satchel and brought it to the bed. Turning it upside down, the money inside fell out and fluttered onto Isaac’s lap. 

“I…I did this. I’ve… _Zur Hölle damit_! I wasn’t going to let those crooks run over me like common street trash! They steal, so why shouldn’t I?! I did it for Mother, and Esther, and Rose, and even Hannah!” 

His father laid there mute and unmoving. Mordecai felt like screaming. 

Breathing heavily, Mordecai, fourteen years old and still lost in the world, sank to his knees. He bowed his head and laid his forehead on the bed. 

After a few moments of silence, he felt his father’s hand lay on top of his head. 

Mordecai looked up. In that moment he could so clearly his father has he used to be— strong, wise, considerate— look into him with a mercy that glowed greater than any hellfire. 

Isaac pointed at the menorah. Mordecai took a deep breath, stood on shaking legs, and went into the kitchen. He returned with a box of matches. He struck the match, and lit the first candle. Then he used this candle to light all nine candles, one by one. The flames burned calmly, resolute to the inevitable outcome of its light. When the time came, the wax would melt and shorten, the flame would fade out. For now, the world would know of its existence as seen through the window of that small New York apartment. By the end of that night, when the snow had settled and the families would sleep in, the candles would breathe their last. 

Isaac took Mordecai by the wrist, and placed a pocketwatch into his open hand. It was the one he had brought overseas, the one he had carried with him as he settled down with a family, never once thinking his time would be taken from him. 

Hours later, just before the break of dawn, Isaac Heller went to sleep and did not wake up. 

Mordecai sat on the stairs outside with his sisters. They sat on either side of him, shivering in the cold. They held onto his arms, leaning on him and trying to contain their tearful sniffles. 

Within his breast pocket he could feel the pocketwatch ticking in rhythm to his heart. 

——————————— 

The morphine was beginning to wear off. Mordecai sat in the parlor room of the funeral home, the flowery design of the couch giving him double-vision. He refocused his attention on the Christmas tree. It was decorated in tinsel, brass ornaments, and red ribbons. Little tea candles held in glass orbs emitted ethereal light in the room. It was the same light that had entranced him when the bullet fragments were being removed from his shoulder. 

His right hand reached up and grasped the wound, now bandaged and sore, but mended nonetheless. Now all he needed was time— 

He heard voices mingle, “If he could survive a blast to the head, then he can survive this”, and he figured that whatever was so damn important could wait until— 

The blurry figure of Elsa Arbogast entered the room. 

His thoughts faded. 

She spoke to him. He didn’t register what she said, except for a few numbers— milligrams or such of a liquid— then she flicked at a glass syringe she held in her hand. 

He felt the syringe prick into the crook of his arm, and a few seconds after, the world went soft, the lights of the Christmas tree dovetailing into a prism of heavenly passage. 

The woman capped the syringe. As she made to leave the room, Mordecai spoke to her. She stopped. She had heard that language before, years ago, when she was stationed as a nurse overseas. 

There had been an enemy soldier in the army hospital with no name, no identification, and no family. He had been laid in a cot, his bandaged head bleeding continuously throughout the night. During her nightly rounds, moving through the dozens of rows of injured men, the man lifted his hand at her, and said the same thing this young triggerman, Mordecai Heller, was saying now. 

“Ich will nach hause.” 

Elsa stood there, unmoving, her hands in the pockets of her dress. 

She recalled how that young man in the War had pleaded to hold her hand, murmuring those exact same words before the light faded from his eyes. 

Elsa reminisced, slipping out of the parlor room as Mordecai whispered softly, “Don’t forget to light the candles.” 

His thoughts floated along the wing of a bird towards his home in New York, back to the place where his father used to light the candles, the scene shifting until Mordecai imagined himself in that deathbed instead of Isaac— weak, mute, and blind. The world went dark, and he thought he could smell the dredged dirt of his father’s grave push him down into the earth. 

——————————— 

Mordecai didn’t wake up so much as he realized where he was. The trees were moving past him, the road flowing beneath him. He sat up, situating himself upright in the automobile’s front seat. Next to him he saw Atlas at the wheel. The older man glanced over at Mordecai. 

“It’s hard business, isn’t it?” 

Mordecai’s hand slipped into his trench coat, touching his bicep, his fingers sliding over the fresh wounds. 

“Viktor is driving the truck we procured.” 

He paused, adding, “I’m grateful for you boys tonight. You showed real grit. I’m proud of you.” 

Mordecai blinked. The morphine continued to float through his bloodstream. He leaned against the door, his forehead touching the glass window. He could see the snow on the ground, covering the forest floor in white. The car’s tires crunched over the slushed ice. 

Up ahead he saw the faint outline of the truck, its exhaust pipe puffing out black smoke into the night. 

“Mordecai. I want to tell you this now, while we’re alone.” 

Atlas looked out, his eyes steady as ever. 

“I proposed to Mitzi. You remember Mitzi?” 

Mordecai breathed out, “Yes.” 

“We’re getting married in the Spring.” 

The car chugged along. The forest was becoming thinner, and over the crest of the horizon they could see the twinkling lights of St. Louis. 

“Another thing.” 

Atlas rummaged in his waistcoat pocket. He pulled forth a pocketwatch and handed it to his young hitman. 

Mordecai took it, his eyes adjusting to the darkness until he realized it was his father’s pocketwatch. A bullet fragment had pierced it. The glass was shattered, the gears all but blown to bits. 

Nisht. 

The candles extinguishing their light. 

Mordecai tucked the broken watch into his pocket, his arm aching with the effort. 

Atlas extended his hand out again. Mordecai didn’t register at first what he was being offered until he took hold of it. The gold pocketwatch fit into the palm of his hand, the measure of its ticking immediate and familiar. 

“I want you to have it,” Atlas stated. “My father gave it to me before he passed, and now, I’m giving it to you.” 

Mordecai balked, shaking his head. 

“Sir, I can’t possibly—” 

“I am giving it to you,” Atlas insisted. 

Mordecai sunk back into the seat. Up above, the clouds had parted to reveal a crescent moon, its light shining towards the east. 

He closed his eyes, and remembered running— running as far as he could, as fast as he could, into the city that gleamed gold.


	4. Chapter 4

**Part Four**  
**Autumn, 1926**

He did it in broad daylight. Mordecai Heller never did these sorts of things during the day, unless it was an absolute necessity of life or death. 

The bullet now lodged in Viktor Vasko’s knee could have waited until nightfall, but Mordecai didn’t know he was going to shoot the gun until that exact, hairpin moment. The .45 Colt cartridge rolled across the tiled floor of the cafe. 

He stood there, the barrel of the gun still smoking. Viktor knelt to the ground, his two large, burly hands grasping at his knee. 

As with every bullet he fired, Mordecai accepted that he had done what he had done and there was no turning back. 

Wiping the M1911 pistol with his handkerchief, he said, “I tried to reason with you.” 

——————————— 

“I’m trying to reason with you Viktor,” the young bookkeeper asserted. He furiously straightened his glasses. “Egg yolk and oil should not be combined into a paste— stop laughing—You don’t mix egg yolk and oil together into a paste. It’s abhorrent, flagrant to the sanctity of culinary respectability.” 

He shook his head, rolling his eyes as he returned his attention to the rifle scope in front of him. 

“Really. It’s not that hard to understand.” 

Viktor stared at the young man, a slight twitch to his eyebrow. 

“You are crazy. Bláznivý.” 

“Gesundheit.” 

Viktor laughed, focusing his one eye into his own sniper rifle’s scope. 

“And sometime funny.” 

Several yards away the partridges were strutting out of the tall grass. Mordecai closed his eye, his finger lightly touching the trigger. 

The two men were lying on their stomachs, side by side, in the open field. The morning sun had risen behind a pink haze of fog. The grassland was wet with dew and a blue mist painted the horizon. 

“You vait. They get closer,” Viktor breathed. 

It had been the Slovak’s idea to go hunting early that morning. It was Autumn, the bookkeeping ledger for the year 1925 was nearly complete, and an easy-going atmosphere had settled over the Lackadaisy crew. Atlas’s business was soaring, and his two most valuable hitmen were partly responsible for the ardent success. Word had spread that they could take out a whole posse with nothing but their bare fists and a crowbar— one rumor went around that they had, in fact, taken out twelve men with nothing but one crowbar to share between them. The assertion was that once they arrived on the scene, it was better to hide or be complicit. 

Better yet, one could practice foresight and choose not to step on their heels in the first place. 

The first partridge took off, a short burst of upward momentum lifting it into the pink sky. Mordecai pulled the trigger. The rifle blast echoed throughout the landscape, causing the flock to scatter into the air, before coming down to earth, where they fled as fast as their legs could carry them into the surrounding brush. 

“Arrgh!” Viktor shouted. “You fire too soon!” He ran a hand down his bearded face, putting the safety clip back on the rifle. 

Mordecai gaped at him before barking, “I shot it! That’s the whole point, is it not?!” 

“Yah, but—” the big man stood, the ends of his coat damp from the dew. “—only one close. You vait til all are close.” 

Mordecai stood, cocking the bolt on the rifle and causing the shell to eject. 

Together they trampled through the field, searching for the dead bird. 

Viktor found it, picking it up by the neck. He whistled. 

“You shot head off,” he said, tossing the partridge to Mordecai. The bookkeeper startled, catching the bird haphazardly as loose feathers floated around him. 

“That’s good,” Mordecai said. He held the dead bird out from him, his upper lip curling in disgust. 

“It is good shot,” Viktor agreed. Putting his hands in his coat pocket, he began walking through the field, the rifle snug under his arm. 

Mordecai followed suit, raising the rifle and propping it against his shoulder. 

“Is that a compliment?” 

The big Slovak shrugged, a slight smile on his mouth. 

“Could be.” 

The sun crested over the tree-line, glinting off Mordecai’s glasses as they trailed towards the truck. 

Before Viktor opened the driver’s side door, he paused, asking over the truck’s hood, “Say. How you learn to shoot?” 

Mordecai gave a dry laugh, adjusting his glasses as he tossed the dead partridge to his partner. 

“Why the sudden curiosity?” Mordecai asked. 

Viktor caught the bird, then looked up, rubbing at his chin. 

“Ve Vork together for years. Never talk about past.” 

Mordecai got into the truck, slamming shut the passenger door. 

“ _Precisely_ ,” he murmured. 

——————————— 

The first time he shot a gun he was forced. Not forced to hurt anyone or kill anything, but forced as a joke, a jest that was supposed to humiliate him. 

Mordecai had been working for three days as a bookie for his employer, an Italian gang boss by the name of Mr. Giovanni Rossi. The man was lean, sharp, and incredibly biased. He handpicked Italians to be in the syndicate, occasionally giving a few immigrant Irishmen a chance to prove their worth to his enterprise. When his men heard that he’d hired Mordecai as an accountant, a mere kid of thirteen years, they nearly pulled a muscle from laughing. 

“Surely you’re pulling our leg, hiring a fuckin’ Jew as a bookie.” 

Mordecai watched the exchange happen from a dark corner of the restaurant. Dried blood was smeared on his mouth and chin. 

The restaurant served as a false front for the gang’s activities. It was located in a tiny nook in the Bowery. Inside it was plainly decorated, with sepia colored photos of family members hanging from the walls, black and white tiled floors, and a single ceiling fan which precariously wobbled with each rotation. Rossi’s men sat at a table, playing cards, under the ceiling fan. 

Mordecai imagined taking a pistol and shooting the fan down on top their heads. 

“Ross, you need to lay off the bottle,” Conrad said, a fat cigar pinched between his teeth. Conrad was a cousin of Rossi, but that didn’t give him special privileges above the other gang members. His dark, deep-set eyes could put the fear of God into any opponent, and he used his domineering presence to his advantage when stalking a target. 

Rossi stopped laughing. He reached out and smacked Conrad in the back of the head, causing cigar ash to sputter across the table. 

He leaned in, his voice lowering into a whisper. He pointed in Mordecai’s direction as he spoke. 

“That ‘fucking Jew’ as you put it just saved me ten grand.” 

The men all turned to look at the boy. He was standing motionless in his knee-pants, his shirt stained crimson, his thick rimmed glasses covering most of his face. 

“You’re kidding.” 

Rossi leaned back in his chair. 

“Swear on my mutha’s grave. You know that contractor in Staten? The rat was giving us the slip. That kid comes in here looking for a job counting numbers, I say’s, ‘give him over to our guy Patrick, help him with the bookie work.’ Patrick comes to me, shows me the kid recalculated the ledgers and found that something wasn’t quite adding up. Kid’s moved the wool from our eyes, saved the entire operation about ten grand.” 

Conrad laid a card down. Another of Rossi’s men, Sapphire, nicknamed such for the blue-grey scar that ran down his face, ashed his cigarette before speaking. 

“Listen, that’s great and all, but we’re not a daycare, alright? We can’t be stuck sitting ‘round babysitting when shit hits the fan.” 

Rossi pinched the cigarette from Sapphire’s mouth and placed it in his own mouth. 

He chuckled, the puffs of smoke rising into the lethargic turn of the ceiling fan. 

“I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about that, buddy.” 

——————————— 

Earlier that day Mordecai had been working under the tutelage of Patrick, an Irishman who talked with a thick brogue and who chain-smoked more than anyone Mordecai had ever met. He worked in a dark office in the back of the restaurant, chain smoking and berating Mordecai any chance he could. 

Because he smoked so much his ashtray was constantly overflowing. With the arrival of Mordecai as his assistant, the Irishman now had someone to go dump the ashtray into the alleyway behind the restaurant several times a day. Between these excursions, Mordecai would sit on an overturned pail and do mathematics, easy figures that were boring him to death. 

Patrick left the room for a few minutes, and Mordecai took the chance to start going through the big ledger on his desk. He worked as fast as he could, writing in red china marker, his eyes darting over the page as he found an underestimation in the business’s income. With no time to use the adding machine, Mordecai recalculated the numbers in his own head. 

Patrick came sauntering back into the room, sucking at his cigarette in full-force when he caught the boy at his desk. He grabbed Mordecai by the collar and gave him a good throttling before ordering the kid to go outside and dump out his ashtray. 

Mordecai glared at the Irishman, adjusting his crooked glasses as he stepped out the backdoor, the powdery ash fluttering onto his shirt. 

The summer heat radiated throughout the city. Outside in the alleyway, a group of teenagers were gathered, talking and cursing at each other in rough, accusatory voices. One of them held a pistol in his hands. He aimed it at an empty soup can about ten meters away. There were six soup cans lined up on a piece of plywood. The plywood was balanced atop two wood barrels. 

The teenager fired the shot. It missed and the bullet pinged off the ground. 

He kicked at the dirt and handed the gun over. 

“How the hell did you get a Luger anyway? I thought they only made ‘em in Germany.” 

“Mr. Rossi knows some guys. He set me up.” 

“Lucky sonuvabitch.” 

The boys stopped talking when they saw Mordecai. They called out to him. 

“Aren’t you Patrick’s new lackey boy?” 

Mordecai ignored them, turning the ashtray over and giving it a quick shake. He turned and darted up the wooden steps but was stopped. The tallest boy, named Jules, blocked his path, his thumbs tucked between his suspenders. 

“If you work for Patrick, you’re working for Rossi. And if you work for Rossi—” 

Another teenager piped in, “Ya gotta know how to shoot.” 

Mordecai looked him up and down. 

“No thanks.” 

Jules laughed before wrapping an arm around Mordecai and leading him into the middle of the alley. 

“I gotta know. Does having four eyes make you a better shot?” 

The teenagers chuckled. They crossed their arms, their dirty hands passing around rolled cigarettes. 

Mordecai sneered at him, jerking away from his grasp, but the teenager had strength and height on him. Jules turned and pushed Mordecai down. 

The young bookkeeper stood, fixing his glasses, his oversized shirt hanging off his shoulder. 

The teenagers had formed a barrier between him and the door. He looked at each one of them independently before taking the gun. 

Jules clapped and whooped into the air. Another of the boys whispered, “This oughta be good.” 

Mordecai held the gun in both hands, staring at it. He had never held a gun before and its weight both frightened and intrigued him. Before he could situate himself to shoot, Jules called out, “Wait!” 

He grabbed the collar of Mordecai’s shirt and dragged him to the very end of the alley. 

“We’ve got to give the new lackey boy a challenge.” 

He stopped and drew a line into the dirt with his foot, positioning the boy behind the line. 

He said to Mordecai, “Pull this lever back when you’re ready to fire.” He pointed at the safety lock, which was slender against the gun’s frame, then gave Mordecai a light slap on the face before jogging back to the group. 

The boys raised their cigarettes, shouting, “Here, here”, their juvenile snickers filling the air. 

Jules crossed his arms and squinted his eyes from the midday sun. 

“That’s over fifteen meters,” someone said. 

“Fifteen? I’d say more than twenty.” 

They watched, waiting. 

Mordecai lifted the gun. The handle was too big for him and the weight made his hand shake as he tried to aim. He closed one eye, trying to pinpoint the soup can. The summer heat created a mirage over the alley, rising up and over the targets. Swallowing, his throat stuck dryly to his tongue. Mordecai squinted against the sunlight, pricks of sweat forming on his forehead. With his thumb he released the safety lock. 

He pulled the trigger. The pistol whipped back and smacked him right in the nose. 

The teenagers burst into laughter as Mordecai stumbled backwards, falling onto the ground, holding his face. His glasses had been knocked off. Blindly he felt along the ground for them, shakily putting them back on to see the blood dripping from his nose onto the dirt. 

The teenagers were falling over themselves with laughter, leaning on trash cans and into each other’s shoulders. Jules face was scrunched, his eyes nearly brimming with tears. 

Mordecai picked up the gun as he got to his feet, his eyes narrowing and a darkness overtaking his stare as he straightened himself. He did not wipe the blood from his face. It flowed down his mouth, dripping down his chin, collecting onto his shirt as he raised the gun once more. 

He lined his sight down the thin barrel, slick and sharp as the blade of a knife. He fired once, twice, three times in succession. Three of the soup cans popped into the air. 

Mordecai’s eyes widened as he breathed into three more shots. 

Four, five, six. The soup cans rolled in the dirt, a bullet hole placed directly in their center. 

The teenagers stared in silence at the shot cans, then turned their heads in unison to look at the Heller boy. 

He was breathing heavily through the blood in his nose, his eyes still wide and unblinking. He continued to pull the trigger even though it clicked blank, signaling that the cartridge was empty of bullets. 

One of the boys straightened, slapping Jules on the arm and pointing in the direction of the backdoor. 

Mr. Giovanni Rossi was standing on the steps, his suit jacket hanging over his arm, his hand in his pocket. He pushed the brim of his hat up with his thumb and whistled low and clear. 

The boss waved his hand over. Mordecai lowered the gun, the adrenaline coursing through his veins causing him to tremble. 

“Kid, I got some people I’d like you to meet,” Rossi said, letting the bespectacled boy walk ahead of him. As Mordecai passed the group of boys, Jules asked, “How’d you get bullseye six times in a row?” 

Mordecai’s gaze darkened. He didn’t look at him as he shoved the Luger pistol into the tall boy’s hands. 

“Easy,” he said, looking straight ahead, “I just pretended the cans were your heads.” 

——————————— 

The pistol hung heavy in his holster as he spoke with his partner. The autumn breeze rolled red and orange leaves across the damp sidewalk and into the garage. It had rained last night and the sky was threatening to rain again that morning. 

The Slovak had agreed to speak with the New Yorker in private that morning— or at least, he silently tolerated it. Viktor was repairing a piece-of-junk clunker of a truck in the garage in the hopes that Mitzi could sell it. Debt was procuring for Lackadaisy, and by summer’s end of 1926 the vast majority of Atlas’s crew had resigned. 

Mordecai had mentioned to Viktor several times that good work could be found elsewhere in the city; perhaps, with their strengths combined, they could find work in a completely new city, somewhere far from the memory of this place. 

As Viktor lifted the cylinder from the engine, Mordecai recalled how a few months prior they had lowered Atlas’s coffin into the ground. 

Mordecai explained his proposition. The big Slovak said nothing, did not even seem to acknowledge him. Mordecai felt irritation creeping within him. 

He held his hat over his chest. 

“Without Atlas this establishment has become a practical no man’s land. It’s headed into the ground— if vagrants don’t ransack it first, then the bank will.” 

Viktor reached into the engine and unscrewed a bolt, first with his hands, and then with a wrench. 

“I’m asking you to resign. Leave this place— with or without me, but there’s no use in growing old in a business like this.” 

Viktor continued to tinker with the engine. Mordecai narrowed his eyes. 

“Are you listening to me?” 

Viktor glanced up. He shrugged. 

“I stay.” 

“You shouldn’t,” Mordecai retorted. 

Mitzi May appeared at the door connecting the garage to the Little Daisy Cafe. She called for the boys to come in for lunch. 

Viktor wiped his hands on a rag. 

The chilly autumn wind blew into the garage, causing a stack of newspapers to ruffle, one of which tumbled across the floor and stopped at Viktor’s feet. It had opened to the sports section, headlining yesterday’s horserace winners. 

“I don’t have time to argue with you,” Mordecai said. The pocketwatch he carried seemed to tick faster as he followed Viktor into the cafe. 

——————————— 

“I get the worse feeling about number five, boss. Look at him. Gait’s all wrong.” 

Atlas May looked through a pair of binoculars down at the racetrack. The track was a muddy mess. The rain had not let up all morning and the crowd was starting to get antsy about who they’d made bets on. 

Out in the haze of the pouring rain, five horses could be seen trotting up and down the length of the track. 

Number five, the small black colt, was keeping his head arched and low, as though he couldn’t stand the feeling of rain falling over him. 

A few dozen spectators were already retreating to the betting booth to try to rectify their doubts. 

“Well, he did a twenty-five second run in a quarter-mile during training yesterday.” 

“Get outta here!” 

Atlas’s boys argued back and forth. Cigarette smoke whirled between their hands. Barney, the one adamant about who would win, slapped the back of his hand against his palm, cigarette clenched tight between his lips. 

“There’s no way a little runt like that could breeze a twenty-five,” he asserted, wildly jutting his hand towards the track. 

Mordecai Heller took a deep sigh. He pulled the watch from his waistcoat pocket and checked the time. The race was delayed, but that was a given because of the rain. He was looking forward to when this would be over so he could go back to his apartment and sit down with a cup of tea and a book. 

His partner Viktor, towering a head taller than his compatriots, tapped a rolled up copy of the day’s racing program against his bicep. Its headline read Fairmount Park; its date October, 20th, 1925. 

“Atlas sir, tell this fool there ain’t no way number five could breeze let alone win a gotdamn race,” Barney implored. 

Atlas lowered his binoculars. He reached into his coat pocket and took out his wallet. Wetting his thumb with the tip of his tongue, he steadily separated the bills, counting them astutely, and then handed them to Mordecai. 

“Go to the betting booth and place this on number five,” he instructed. He gestured at Viktor. “Join him.” 

Hoots and hollers came up from Atlas’s gang, and Barney smacked his forehead with his hand, groaning in dismay. 

Mordecai heard them arguing amongst themselves once more, Barney’s voice the loudest and most determined. 

Adjusting his glasses and pocketing the money, Mordecai went down the flight of stairs leading to the paddock area, Viktor’s heavy footsteps trailing behind him. The bookkeeper kept his hands in his pockets, a chill to the rainy autumn day causing him to bristle and shiver. 

From across the paddock, a horse was being brushed down. Mud caked its legs and water dripped from its mane and tail. 

Mordecai stepped to the betting booth, tilting his hat up with his thumb. He gave the money to the ticket master. 

“Numbuh five—” he cleared his throat, surprised his Manhattan accent came through so distinctly, “—Number five to win.” 

“Oh, Father Christmas,” the ticket master jived, “he’s a smart looking fella ain’t he?” 

Mordecai simply stared. 

The ticket master counted the money, and gave Mordecai the betting ticket, not without a wink first and a quick, “Best of luck to ya pal.” 

Mordecai tucked the ticket into his pocket. Together, he and Viktor walked briskly through the drizzle, their shoes splashing in puddles. Mordecai lifted the collar of his trench coat, Viktor used his racing program to shield his eyes. The rain let loose harder now, so with a quick walk and leaping jog, the two men sought shelter under the paddock’s awning. 

Mordecai removed his gloves, wringing them free of excess water, then exhaled hotly into his hands, rubbing them together to try to warm up. 

“You and ticket man. Same place?” 

Mordecai wasn’t sure what Viktor meant for a moment. 

Viktor added, “You talk the same.” 

Mordecai hummed. 

“It certainly would seem he’s from Manhattan. Either that or he’s mocking me.” He gave a death glare in the direction of the ticket booth, “He should hope for his life it’s not the latter.” 

Viktor’s booming laugh rang out, echoing through the empty stables. 

“You are crazy,” the Slovak admonished, the patch over his eye crinkling with his grin. “Blázon. How long has it been?” 

“Pardon?” 

“How long ve vork together, yes?” 

Mordecai leaned forward and looked up at the sky. The rainwater dripped on his face. 

“Years, I suppose.” 

“As expression goes. Time flies.” 

A horse being led by a groom walked by. The groom was a boy no more than fourteen or fifteen years old. The horse’s head hung low, his dark, tired eye reflecting the two men before continuing on its way. 

Even though they argued more often than not, sometimes to the point of throwing fists, Mordecai realized he had never had a partner for this long— and he’d certainly never had a partner he could depend upon, someone he knew who would have his back— that is, until he started working with Viktor. 

Mordecai felt his hand reach for his pocketwatch. His thumb brushed over the smooth casing. 

——————————— 

“So that’s how it’s going to be,” Mordecai said. Viktor took a seat at the cafe counter. 

Zib and his band peered from a nearby booth. Mitzi stood behind the counter, her eyes darting between the two men. 

“Is everything alright?” she asked. 

Viktor said nothing as Mordecai bristled. He put his hat on, saying, “Fine. If that’s the way you want it.” 

The triggerman made for the front door, a picture of Atlas on the wall watching him as he went. Abruptly he stopped and turned around, as though he had forgotten something. He reached into his suit jacket and in one swift motion pulled the pistol from its holster, aimed it directly at Viktor’s knee, and fired point blank. 

The sound of the shot lingered in the air, bouncing off the walls of the cafe and ringing as the .45 cartridge rolled on the ground. 

Mitzi screamed, her face blanched as she covered her mouth in shock. Zib and his band stood, not sure whether to run or attack or cower under the table. 

Viktor did not scream, which surprised Mordecai. Usually, they always screamed, especially if he shot the kneecap out first before delivering the killing blow. 

The barrel of Mordecai’s gun was still smoking as Viktor slid off the barstool and crumpled over. A low, guttural animal groan rumbled in the back of his throat. 

As Mordecai wiped the gun clean with his handkerchief, he said, “I tried to reason with you.” 

He turned to Mitzi, adding, “Consider this my resignation.” 

He was about to leave when Viktor suddenly lunged forward, his fist veering up and hitting Mordecai straight in the gut. The smaller man stumbled backwards, ramming into a table booth. He doubled over, clutching at his stomach, the wind having been knocked out of him. 

_I should have known_ , he mused. Even with a blown-out kneecap, Viktor Vasko would still get his punches in. The old Slovak bear never did give up easy. 

The two men knelt to the ground, Viktor’s hands cupped around his knee, Mordecai’s arms grasped at his chest as he tried to regain his breath. 

He stood, wheezing as he spoke, “You’re…lucky I….didn’t shoot you…in the head.” 

Viktor, his teeth bared, roared, “Čubčí syn! Prisahám— _you are crazy_!” 

The pain in his eyes raged like an inferno. The blood ran down his leg and soaked his trousers. 

Mordecai breathed heavily, his legs shaking. He smoothed his hand over his hair and tucked the pistol back into its hidden holster. 

“I would have preferred giving you a watch or a bottle of gin as a retirement gift. But you didn’t leave me with much choice.” 

Viktor growled under his breath. His entire body strained to lunge at his ex-partner, but the wound would not allow it. 

Mitzi came from behind the counter, examining Viktor. She glared at Mordecai, before shaking her head and bounding into the cafe’s office to call for an ambulance. 

Mordecai stepped out of the cafe, but not before giving himself one last glance at his old partner. 

The rage in Viktor’s eyes was nothing short of murderous, and Mordecai knew that look meant he would forever be a limp in the man’s walk, an irreversible ache in his bones, a clock whose hands were always, indefinitely, going to be stuck at this very moment. 

Mordecai Heller turned his back, and stepped into the grey autumn light.


	5. Chapter 5

**Part Five**  
**Spring, 1927**

Anger ate him up like a starving beast. 

Worst of all, it came out of hibernation at the most inconvenient times: now, for instance, the anger was threatening to come baring its teeth at every single occupant in this godforsaken hotel room. 

Mordecai tolerated the Savoys. To him, they were the type to drift through life with no real plan and still end up lucky somehow. It was maddening to accept that the strings of fate could allow such twisting and manipulation, but alas, the world worked in mysterious ways, and all Mordecai Heller could hope for was answers. 

It only added to his irritation. Hope was useless to him. He needed real, tangible, objective fact. He needed results. 

He wanted the truth. _No one_ pulled the wool over his eyes, and he’d be damned if two backwater Cajuns would be the crux to his crucifix. 

And so when they were late for their initial meeting that night, Mordecai went to their hotel room. He kept his distance from the debauchery and reminded his associates of that night’s job. 

They talked of _diable_ and _de loa_ and other mystical nonsense. He wasn’t sure how the conversation could have drifted into, into _this_ , but it was as though the siblings had rowed themselves downstream, fished the drowning triggerman out of the water, and tied him up like a catfish writhing at the bottom of their boat. 

Before he could fully react to the situation, the pair of them had him restrained, his tie loosened, and his shirt untucked. 

“Mon chere, don’t look so upset. Dis is a _gift_.” 

Serafine gave a nod to her brother Nico. The boxer moved behind the triggerman, yanking his suit jacket down and tossing it across the room. 

Mordecai’s stare darkened. Every ounce of him wanted to pull out his pistol and put a bullet into the situation, but he knew he had to remain complicit. He had an agenda and it was not about to be compromised because of two siblings and their ridiculous voodoo fantasies. 

“Strip him bare,” Serafine demanded. “I like to see what I’m working with.” 

Zulie, the woman who had taken off his tie, stepped in front of him, swiftly removing the gun holster strapped across his chest. She unbuttoned his shirt, flashing him a quick smirk that made him avert his gaze. His pounding heart made his ears feel like they were stuffed with cotton. His mouth dried and his hand gripped tightly on the chair. She pulled the shirt free, sliding the sleeves down his arms, her own arms going around his waist before stepping to the side, his shirt bunched up in her arms. 

She looked at Serafine, who shook her head. 

“All of it.” 

Zulie stepped forward again, tugging the white tank top up and over his head. Mordecai’s glasses we caught in the movement, causing them to slip and fall to the ground. 

He felt the stare of the crowd behind her: whispering, waiting, watching like the unblinking faux eyes of a peacock’s tail feathers. 

Bare chested and provoked, Mordecai began to object. He made to grab his shirt back from the young woman, but Nico reached from behind, taking hold of his wrists. 

The anger in him grew. He shouldered away but Nico held him tighter, situating himself so that the hitman’s arms were completely restrained. 

He whispered in his ear, “She’s right, ya know. Dis a gift.” 

Serafine stood in front of him, the knife glittering light off its sharp blade. She tilted her head, her lips puckered in concentration. She was studying him, watching how his breathing had become faster, how the bones of his ribcage expanded and contracted, the way his upper lip curled into a snarl. 

“ _Mais_ , you are a _furious_ creature!” she exclaimed. Serafine chuckled, the bones of her necklace rattling. She rested her hand on her hip, cocking her head to the side, studying his body carefully. 

“Look’it here.” She brushed the tip of the knife over Mordecai’s scars— the shotgun blast on his shoulder, the misshapen disfigurement valleyed on his waist, the faint splattering of scars near the temple of his head. “Quite the scrapper.” 

Serafine examined the blade. 

“Only more reason de’blanc has been watching you dis entire time.” 

She held Mordecai by the jaw and looked into his eyes. 

“Hold still.” 

She dug the tip of the knife into his chest, right above the heart. 

Mordecai refused to look at her. 

Pressure was applied to the knife, and it made its first incision into his flesh. 

Mordecai flinched, an involuntary hiss escaping his mouth. 

Still, he refused to look at her. Serafine stopped. She smacked him briskly under his jaw to get his attention. 

Mordecai lifted his eyes and looked straight at her. Something was boiling under the surface, the three of them could feel it, and Serafine raised her brow. She gave a look at Nico. The man tightened his hold, his breath hot on the back of the triggerman’s neck. 

The knife worked its way into his body. He could feel the break of skin, the blood starting to rise hot to the surface. The blood beaded together until it slid down his chest, down his stomach, soaking into the waistband of his trousers. He didn’t cry, it wasn’t in his nature, but he imagined if he did then this is what it would feel like— a body carved, a slow trickle, an unavoidable stain that would never come out. 

“Do you enjoy dis?” 

She paused to trace the edge of the knife down his jaw. 

Mordecai flinched, and with a surge of anger attempted to free himself of Nico’s grip. Dozens of eyes were watching him, chastising him, either ridiculing him or devouring him— or both. His face burned. He felt a hard, hot lump form in his throat. To have this happening in front of a crowd, bare, unclothed, and being scarified, it was worse than a bullet to the shoulder, a wound to the gut, a bullet fragment stuck inside his skull. He would have taken those again in a cyclic purgatory for all eternity, rather than endure another moment of this. 

The more cuts were made to the sigil, the more the pain surfaced. The tear in his gut…Mitzi’s hands tangled in his hair…the scream of that little Italian girl…running from the bigger boys in his neighborhood…putting baby Hannah into the ground…the embezzlement, the lying, his mother’s quiet crying when she thought no one could hear, the night his father asked him to light the candles…crippling Viktor, the day Atlas was discovered dead…the fact that he was being ordered to kill without really knowing _why_ he was killing…it wasn’t enough, it was never enough… 

He shuddered. It was shame. He felt tremendous, horrible, relentless shame, resentment that would not quiet, and an anger which refused to be satiated. The blood over his heart slid down his chest as the knife continued to dig deeper. 

Serafine paused. She tutted under her breath. 

“Is only skin deep, chere.” She pouted, but there was a sincerity to her words. She leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his cheek. 

Mordecai veered back in disgust. Nico’s hand wrapped around his throat, holding him subdued. 

“You ever wonder? How some of dem, da last ting dey saw before they died was your face? Like looking at a devil.” 

The eyes of the crowd bore into him. 

“Did you like it?” 

“No.” 

“Then why do it.” 

“Because I had to.” 

“Mais. Then you will understand why I have to do dis.” 

The knife carved into him again, and Mordecai shuddered, his vision going out of focus. The pain in his scars gripped him like the teeth of a predator. 

Atlas gave him his own gun to keep. 

_Gimel._

Atlas gave him a job. He trusted him. 

_It’s ‘caught like fish in a barrel’, dimwit._

The rendezvous went bad. It got ugly quick. 

_How will we survive?_

A trigger pulled, a bullet sent. The flash of bright light. The rattling cage of his head holding a devil imprisoned. 

_Nisht._

_Mordecai! Christ, wake up!_

_He’s been damn near shot—_

“Don go to that dark place boy.” 

Serafine’s fingers snapping in front of his face. Atlas’s fingers snapping in front of his face. 

“If you still feel pain, dat’s good.” 

Of course. He breathed into the fresh cuts on his chest, this imprint becoming another fact of his living, breathing, scarred body. He looked into the watching eyes of the crowd. 

The world was changing. The world was moving rapidly into the new century. The world was on fire and he had made himself cold to survive. 

“Pain means you are still alive.” 

Mordecai looked up, and saw the rising tendrils of white smoke swirl into a shape, a sound, a spirit. It formed some phantom haunt, a beast both smiling and snarling, as if to say he wanted nothing more than to kill and be killed.


End file.
